The long-feared Middle East war is here – Asia Times

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Some were surprised by Tehran’s brutal action when it fired more than 180 nuclear rockets at Israel this week in retribution for the Hamas and Hezbollah officials ‘ killings by Israel.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made the immediate announcement that it would cruelly fight at a time of its finding. He said as his safety government gathered for a late-night meet, “whoever attacks us, we attack them”.

The management of Biden reaffirmed its commitment to defending Israel and the country’s anger. The White House said Iran had experience” serious outcomes”, though President Joe Biden urged against strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities.

Therefore, what could Israel’s retribution look like, and is a full-scale conflict between Iran and Israel, and perhaps even the United States, now good?

Regional conflict has already started.

A local conflict is already in place, not just now. Israel and other places and parties far from its borders have stepped up the Middle East, with the conflict that started in Gaza almost a year ago spreading. It also has international repercussions.

As this year’s Egyptian hit demonstrates, the issue has become a strong confrontation between Israel and its European allies on one side, and Iran and its intermediaries, backed by Russia and China, on the other.

Moscow has pledged to give Iran fighter jet and air defense systems, while Washington has played a significant role in providing military help and political support to Israel. Additionally, it is purchasing Egyptian weapons for its own conflict in Ukraine, giving Tehran much-needed dollars.

Additionally, Israel is now engaged on several fronts.

First, its conflict continues in Gaza, where more than 40, 000 Palestinians have been killed. Despite resuming its role as a rebel force, Hamas still has some influence over the Palestinian people.

The Israel Defense Forces ( IDF) are conducting military exercises in the West Bank to stop more terrorist attacks fueled by Iranian weapons and funding for local militants.

However, Iran’s another substitute groups, the Shi’a armies in Iraq and Syria and Houthi rebels in Yemen are also launching missile and drone strikes against Israel. The Houthis in Kuwait have been retaliated against by both Israel and the US.

The most significant challenge, however, is in Lebanon. On October 8, 2023, a moment after Hamas ‘ rampage through southern Israel that resulted in 1, 200 incidents and more than 200 Israelis abducted into Gaza, Hezbollah began firing missiles and other arms at Israel, without provocation, in cooperation with Hamas. More than 60, 000 Israelis living close to the border have been forced to flee their homes as a result.

Two weeks ago, Israel made a significant shift. Hundreds of booby-trapped pagers and walkie-talkies used by Hezbollah were presumably ordered by Netanyahu because they feared the operation was in danger of being exposed.

The IDF followed with a large air strategy aimed at diminishing Hezbollah’s estimated army of 150, 000 weapons, rockets and drones.

It therefore launched a floor intrusion into Lebanon, targeting jobs fortified by Hezbollah’s wealthy Radwan power. Hezbollah should not attempt to infiltrate northern Israel and carry out the crimes committed that on October 7th.

Due to Israeli operations, up to one million Palestinian citizens have been forced to leave their homes.

Israel’s hostile options

Iran has also reportedly launched ballistic missiles at Israel this week, directly involved in the conflict, with the launch of them directly into the conflict.

Israel’s developed anti-missile security systems, assisted by the US, Jordan and other countries, intercepted most of the missiles. One Palestinian was killed by debris in the West Bank after a dozen landed inside Israel.

In recent months, Iran has launched another strong assault against Israel. An Iranian air defense system reportedly guarding a nuclear facility in Isfahan was targeted in a minimal amount by Israel in the first response.

At the time of reading, it is unknown how much of Israel’s retribution actually affected them.

One situation that greatly worries Tehran is that Israel, in cooperation with the US, may target its critical facilities. Its communications and transportation networks, financial institutions, and the oil sector (especially those that make up the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corp‘s ( IRGC ) funding system ) might be among those affected. This may produce conflict within Iran, threatening the government’s survival.

While forcing regime change in Tehran would be extremely difficult, the Iranian leadership is n’t taking any chances. According to reports, it has moved Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to a safe place to stop any attempted death.

The Persian regime’s rapidly expanding nuclear programme, which the US and its allies believe serves as support for its quest of nuclear bombs, is still its jewel in the crown.

As some conservative voices have huge urged, Iranian officials may now worry that Israel and the US could severely harm their nuclear arsenal. Biden, yet, is urging a “proportional” answer instead.

Iran’s air defense systems are even thought to be a way to show that it will become “blind” in an assault on Israel in the future. Various options are also on the board.

A small windows for Israel

Iranian leaders made a hasty declaration of intention to stop hostilities following the missile strike in an effort to lower tensions.

But, the issue has come full circle. Hamas believed Israel may collapse after its October 7, 2023, harm. But, instead, Israel responded with a catastrophic war on Gaza, dismantling many of Hamas ‘ skills but also causing widespread deaths and death.

Also, the decisions by Hezbollah and Iran to attack Israel have proved to be grave miscalculations, underestimating Israel’s resolve to fight with overpowering effect.

The game is now in Israel’s judge. While any retaliation has take account of the fact the Army is already stretched thin across multiple fronts, Iran’s” shaft of weight” has also always appeared more resilient.

Netanyahu is unlikely to let this situation pass, and Israel has only a short window of opportunity to do so.

Ran Porat is affiliate researcher, The Australian Centre for Jewish Civilization, Monash University

This article was republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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Yen at 125 less black swan than gray under Ishiba – Asia Times

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Tokyo: With the yen looking set to skyrocket, the” Ishiba shock” ruining stock investors ‘ week may only just be beginning.

The research here, of course, is to the surprise poll of Shigeru Ishiba as Japan’s probable next prime minister. The veteran lawmaker, a self-described “lone wolf”, seemed to come out of nothing last week to best eight different candidates for the ruling Liberal Democratic Party’s management.

However, the real wonder may be how Ishiba’s long-held beliefs set the stage for an amazing yen protest.

For now, Ishiba, 67, is downplaying his taste for Bank of Japan price hikes and a stronger renminbi. As investors speculate that Ishiba might not be the feared financial hawk, the yen is falling this week. They’re good bad.

Obviously, Ishiba’s officials warned him that perhaps BOJ Governor Kazuo Ueda is bashful about more strengthening. Chances are, too, Ishiba’s inner circle is looking at slowing monetary conditions&nbsp, — and China’s brake — and realizing today might not be the day for more increases in borrowing costs.

However, Ishiba’s preferences for higher prices and a rising japanese are unlikely to hold back for very long. Since&nbsp, July 31, when the BOJ hiked short-term costs to their highest level since 2008, the renminbi has given up its sharp 2024 costs. In late June, it passed the 161 to the US level, the lowest in more than 37 times.

Since then, the dollar has rallied more than 9 %, dealing on October 3 at around 147 to the greenback. And as Ishiba transitions to the position of prime minister, there are good chances that the yen protest will push into even higher products. Could it go to 125 or higher? So do the problems about an” Ishiba shock” soon developing.

Second, Ishiba’s LDP may succeed at the September 27 snap election, the chances of which are good given the persistent turmoil among opposition events. BOJ representatives are likely to believe that Ishiba has their tails when he settles in and attempts to implement zero rates.

It’s Ishiba’s long-held conviction that the ultra-weak japanese is doing more harm than good. He told Reuters as late as August that” the Bank of Japan is on the right plan path to eventually coincide with a world with good interest rates.”

Ishiba continued,” We must realize the positive aspects of price increases, such as a property market rout, have been the focus right now, but we must understand their merits as higher interest rates may lower the costs of imports and create industry more competitive.”

The BOJ’s decision to raise prices to 0.2 % resulted in the Nikkei 225 Stock Average’s worst decline since October 1987, among other “aspects.” On Monday only, the Nikkei fell 5 % as investors assessed Ishiba’s expected economic policy mixture.

Yet it’s difficult to reject the reasoning underlying Ishiba’s take these. The argument is that 25 years of relentless exchange-rate exploitation have had a backseat, which some LDP heavyweights will acknowledge. Ishiba outshined by his surprise victory to gain the LDP election.

Sanae Takaichi, a senator, is one of them, who believes she is the natural heir to Shinzo Abe’s reflationary signal measures.

Takaichi stated on September 19 that” I think it would be terrible to raise interest rates right today.” She added that “what we’re seeing today is cost-push inflation. We must maintain economic plan until real income consistently rise.

The Ishiba believes that a quarter century of free money has stifled the need for the government to revamp labor markets, cut red tape, support a business growth, empower women, and stop the shift of economic power from Tokyo to Shanghai.

It also reduced stress on corporate CEOs to rebuild, develop and get great threats on new products, solutions and industries. It helps explain why Japan is 30th in productivity among the 38 members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development ( OECD ).

Beginning in 2013, the BOJ supersized quantitative easing. By 2018, the BOJ’s balance plate had surpassed the size of Japan’s US$ 4.7 trillion in annual production due to the amount of government bonds and stocks it hoarded. The BOJ had to get an leave because of that purchasing spree, which has now fallen to Ueda.

The aggressive global market response to the BOJ’s&nbsp, July 31&nbsp, tightening has left Team Ueda gun-shy about further movements. However, the need to tighten monetary policy perhaps simply grow as inflation rises.

The problem, says Takeshi Yamaguchi, analyst at Morgan Stanley MUFG, is an “increasingly extreme scarcity at smaller non-manufacturers” that’s driving “further worsening in the work situation overall”.

The biggest give boost for workers in 33 years was scored by Japanese organisations earlier this year. It’s piece of Tokyo’s work over the last few years to generate a “virtuous cycle” of salary increases. The goal is to improve corporate profits to levels that encourage also fatter pay raises, which will in turn boost consumption and GDP.

However, if these increases are not followed by steps to improve overall output, they could lead to inflation. In August, Japan’s” core” consumer price index rose at a 2.8 % year-on-year rate, well above Tokyo’s 2 % target. It marked the third straight month of motion.

” Consequently, underlying inflation may … fast another rate climb by the Bank of Japan at its October meeting”, says Marcel Thieliant, Asia-Pacific scholar at Capital Economics.

Ishiba might provide the walk with the necessary political support. Ishiba’s main objection to the poor japanese is because he thinks it’s causing him to believe that both at home and abroad. It lowers families ‘ purchasing power, making Japan prone to imported inflation caused by higher commodity prices.

Some foreign investors, however, are confounded by a very developed market maintaining a developing-nation-like exchange-rate plan. Why does investors believe that the” Japan is up” tale is true this time if Japan Inc. is not ready to grow without history’s largest corporate welfare scheme?

Some economists predict that Ishiba may back off and force the political dynasty to pressure the BOJ to raise the yen. If thus, the Fumio Kishida government’s plans will continue to exist.

According to Masafumi Yamamoto, a strategist at Mizuho Securities, Ishiba’s” attitude on financial plan is thought to be the same as the Kishida administration, which usually respects the independence of the BOJ, and he is not constantly in favor of raising interest rates.” Therefore, it is likely that the opportunities for the yen to continue to rise are limited in the run-up to the new cabinet’s formation.

We think the most recent political developments in Japan still support a more gradual than accelerated JPY appreciation path, as suggested by UBS analysts in a note.

Strategist Yukio Ishizuki from Daiwa Securities acknowledges that” Ishiba’s comments over the weekend were trying to put out the fire of his hawkish image.”

Since then, says strategist&nbsp, Jeff Weniger at&nbsp, Wisdom Tree&nbsp, Asset Management,” things have settled down. Investors have come to the realization that even if the Fed Funds Rate wins the job, there will still be a yawning gap between the two nations ‘ cost of money.

The outlook of the US Federal Reserve is in fact a wildcard. ” The lack of clarity on how the easing cycle will unfold and the inverted yield curves”, are key challenges facing global markets, says&nbsp, Teresa Ho, a strategist at&nbsp, JPMorgan Chase &amp, Co.

This might explain why so many currency traders insist that the yen wo n’t deviate too far from the current levels. Hedge funds and other speculative entities have more than 66, 000 positions positioned on a rising yen, according to data from the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission ( CFTC ). That’s the most since October 2016.

The size of this position is largely due to the so-called “yen-carry trade,” which has resulted in Japan becoming the world’s top creditor nation by keeping rates at or close to zero since 1999.

Borrowing cheaply in&nbsp, yen &nbsp, and deploying those funds in higher-yielding assets around the globe became the most popular maneuver in finance. Bloomberg data puts the scale of the trade at about$ 4.4 trillion, a sum larger than India’s economy and roughly twice the size of Russia’s.

The global financial system would tremble and quake if the yen-carry trade sprang into chaos. However, a yen move toward 125 to the dollar would be less of a black swan than a gray one with Ishiba as the head of the market.

Follow William Pesek on X at @WilliamPesek

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All the dogs didn’t bark – Asia Times

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Subscribe now&nbsp, for access at a special price of only$ 99/year.

All the dogs did n’t bark

With fuel prices and volatility hardly moving, David P. Goldman highlights the lack of substantial market reaction to Iran’s weapon barrage against Israel. Gold’s solid rise is still strongly related to the US dollar reserves ‘ diversification and US TIPS yields.

FPÖ success latest in a right-wing storm across Europe

According to Diego Faßnacht, right-wing parties have had major electoral success in Europe in 2024, indicating a political shift that has a potential impact on NATO and Ukraine as well.

Russian forces are extremely surrounded, with

According to James Davis, the Ukrainian battlefront have continued to decline over the past month as Russian forces advanced significantly across the front. Russian forces are threatening to encircle Ukrainian forces in a number of sectors, which could put a risk to Russian defense jobs.

Ishiba’s pragmatic economic plan disappoints the merchants

Financial traders are disappointed, but Shigeru Ishiba, a former security minister and experienced politician, is regarded by Asian businesses and the public as a logical choice.

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Sri Lanka’s Dissanayake faces daunting debt dance – Asia Times

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In Sri Lanka, September 21 marked some milestones. Since Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s resignation as the nation’s past elected president in 2022, thousands of people have registered to cast ballots in the first national elections since the country’s largest voter turnout.

A next round of counting had to be conducted after none of the candidates had secured the necessary 50 % of the vote, making it the first time in Sri Lanka’s story.

A matter of the second-choice vote revealed the biggest surprise in years. In Anura Kumara Dissanayake, Sri Lankans, for the first time, elected a candidate who&nbsp, does no belong&nbsp, to the two major parties that have dominated the government’s politics since independence in 1948.

Dissanayake leads the National People’s Power alliance ( NPP ), which includes his Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna ( JVP ) – a party known for its left-wing policies.

Shortly after being sworn in as president, Dissanayake appointed an interim government of three officials. They included educational, female and human rights activist Harini Amarasuriya, who was selected as the second female prime minister in Sri Lanka’s story.

After that, he announced that a legislative election had been held on November 14 and that his Psc alliance’s 225-member parliament, which had only three votes in it, may be disbanded. There is no point continuing with a congress that is incompatible with what the folks want, Dissanayake has previously said.

Dissanayake has a challenging work ahead of him. In 2022, Sri Lanka repaid its debt and halted payments on US$ 78 billion in foreign and home loans, causing the worst economic crises in the country’s story.

And, while no more on the brink of collapse, the market is still in a vulnerable position. So how will Dissanayake revitalize Sri Lanka’s struggling business and, perhaps more importantly, will he be allowed to?

A key challenge for Dissanayake is negotiating the terms of the International Monetary Fund’s ( IMF)$ 2.9 billion bailout loan, which was based on an analysis that presented an overly optimistic outlook for economic growth.

In 2023, appointed operating president Ranil Wickremesinghe and his administration negotiated this product in the midst of a lot of controversy, and it came with incredibly hostile terms for the nation.

These included strict austerity measures, higher prices for necessary goods and services, and restructuring of local debt. This latter determine results in the loss of half of the benefit of working people’s retirement funds over the next 16 years.

Sri Lanka’s ability to meet a number of governmental goals was likewise a condition for the debt reduction. In order to meet these goals, the IMF program will reduce its public debt to 95 % of GDP by 2032, and spend 4 % of GDP each year on servicing its external debt once it is finished. 30 % of all government revenues are going to support debt, which is a major drain on the nation’s sparse resources.

The IMF deal has given the lenders ‘ interests more weight than it has placed on working-class Sri Lankans.

Public criticism has grown as a result of the pain caused by the cost-cutting and poverty. In March, for instance, thousands of workers at hospitals, schools and trains across Sri Lanka went on strike to protest against the government’s poverty travel.

What future?

In one of Wickremesinghe’s last speeches, it was revealed that a draft agreement had been reached with international lenders, who are owed$ 12.5 billion, to rebuild some of the nation’s additional debts. The agreement includes the issuance of new bonds that would monitor the nation’s financial recovery.

Some experts worry that these securities, which would have higher GDP payouts and would serve as no more than a sugar for the government’s creditors, may result in Sri Lanka becoming in debts by the end of the decade.

Dissanayake had first refrain from hurriedly agreeing to this deal with bondholders. But how can he maintain rise without relying on fresh debt? And, important, how can this progress become more equally distributed?

The NPP made it clear that the IMF would be a significant factor in the reform of Sri Lanka’s outside debt during the presidential campaign. Additionally, Dissanayake will need to collaborate strongly with the IMF to re-enter the terms of the financial support it offers. However, if conversations continue, there may be delays in receiving the following amount of money.

It is crucial to take novel conditions into account. Enhancement of social safety nets and incentives for more money to be spent on public services should be included in this new model. Alternatives will need to be found over the long run that include some of the debts that are owed, as well as governmental goals that are feasible, as well as reduce the risk of additional defaults.

Sri Lankans are clamoring for a change in the status quo. The IMF may need to pay attention if Sri Lankans support Dissanayake and the NPP in the upcoming common elections. The winds of change might had suddenly arrived.

Thiruni Kelegama lectures at the University of Oxford’s Oxford School of Global and Area Research on contemporary South Asian issues. At the University of Gothenburg, Kanchana N. Ruwanpura is a professor of growth landscape.

This content was republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original content.

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Brain drain contest: China’s 1,000 Talents vs US soft power – Asia Times

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Pro-Beijing publications have written constantly about the possibility of a “reverse head deplete,” where more and more Chinese researchers are leaving America for jobs in China, in response to concerns that the Trump administration’s China Initiative effort may return. &nbsp,

The Protect America’s Innovation and Economic Security From CCP Act, which calls for the restoration of the canceled China Initiative system, was passed by the Republican-dominated US House of Representatives on September 9.

  • espionage,
  • robbery of trade secrets and intellectual property
  • challenges posed by the Chinese government to critical equipment.

The proposed policy needs to be approved by the US Senate, where Democrats currently hold the majority, before it can become laws. And it needs the name of the US President, who at the time is a Democrat.

In a statement released on September 10, the Biden presidency stated that it opposes this act. It said it has worked to overcome challenges posed by trade-secret fraud, hackers and economic spy, including by stars affiliated with China. &nbsp,

The Department of Justice’s capability to evaluate and prosecute such legal action may be undermined by grouping cases in the manner contemplated by this policy, including by putting more pressure on the DOJ to secure witness and victim teamwork,” it said. &nbsp,

Additionally, the bill, according to it, could lead to inaccurate and damaging common perceptions that the DOJ uses a different standard to look into and prosecute criminal behavior committed against Chinese citizens or Americans of Chinese heritage. &nbsp,

The outcome of the US national election on November 5 does alter how Washington views the subject. And that chance has had an impact on US experts who might be affected.

The China Daily, a mouth of the Chinese Communist Party, said in August that some experts of Chinese origin in the US were leaving the country because of the “push issue” of the China Initiative, plus some “pull components” from China.

Citing a Stanford study that has the subject” Slow mental dump” Exploring changes among Chinese experts in the US”, the paper said 19, 955 experts of Chinese descent, who began their careers in the US, had left for other countries, including China, between 2010 and 2021.

The Stanford Center on China’s Economy and Institutions (SCCEI ) published the study in July. Its data was derived from a paper published in the Proceedings of the US National Academy of Sciences ( PNAS ) in June 2023. &nbsp,

Before Trump’s campaign for the China Initiative and the 2017 presidential election, the figures were released in a year that marked the start of the statistics. However, according to the study, the number of experts from China-born who are moving out of the US has gradually increased from 900 in 2010 to 2, 621 in 2021. According to the report, “pull factors” include China’s significant and expanding investment in technology and the lucrative economic benefits associated with positions in Chinese institutions.

According to the review, the vast majority of the 5,800 Foreign students who received degrees in science and engineering in 2020 made the decision to remain in the US. &nbsp,

Long-term be rates

According to the South China Morning Post, hundreds of Chinese scientists, including gets Song Sun, molecular researcher Fu Xiangdong, and scientist Sun Xin, have recently switched institutions from American universities to Chinese ones over the past few years. &nbsp,

How many Taiwanese PhD graduates have chosen to remain in the US for the duration was never disclosed by the Hong Kong-based newspapers.

In April 2022, the Center for Security and Emerging Technology ( CSET ), a policy research organization within Georgetown University’s Walsh School of Foreign Service, said that, as of February 2017, 77 % of the more than 178, 000 international science, technology, engineering and mathmatics (STEM) PhD graduates from US universities between 2000 and 2015 were still living in the country. According to the article, these great long-term remain rates are comparable across all different STEM fields.

It said about 90 % of the 55, 000 Chinese nationals and 87 % of the 28, 000 Indian nationals who completed STEM PhD programs in the US between 2000 and 2015 were still living in the country, compared with 66 % of graduates from other countries. &nbsp,

It translates to the decision of about 50, 000 Taiwanese PhD alumni in STEM fields to remain in the US during that time. &nbsp,

Some past

The Trump presidency launched the China Initiative programme in November 2018 to attack hundreds of well-known Chinese-American academics and scientists, alleging they had links to foreign countries. &nbsp,

Charles Lieber, an American scientist and a nanotechnologist at Stanford University, was arrested in January 2020 according to his relations to China’s Thousand Talents Program. &nbsp, In December 2021, he was convicted of two felony counts of making false statements to the FBI and researchers. Additionally, he was found guilty of four counts of using bags of cash to travel from Wuhan to Boston and file false income returns.

Chen Gang, an American mechanical engineer from China and a graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology ( MIT ), was detained in January 2021 on suspicion of allegedly concealing posts held in China in a grant application he submitted to the US Department of Energy in 2017. The Department of Justice, by then under the Biden administration, dropped the charges in January 2022.

On February 22, 2022, the DOJ ended the China Initiative. Last month, China renamed the Thousand Talents Program, which aims to attract international experts aged below 40 to operate in China, giving it the title Qiming Program.

America’s ‘ sweet power ‘&nbsp,

The Stanford report was written by a group led by Xie Yu, a Chinese-American psychologist at Princeton University. According to a 2017 Chinese content, Xie was the head teacher of Peking University’s Thousand Talents Program. &nbsp,

He told China’s Caijing magazine in an interview in April this year that the US will continue to lead the field for many more years thanks to” soft power,” in this case an environment that supports individual creativity and prevents authority, while highlighting the “reverse brain drain” phenomenon in his report last year. &nbsp,

” China now has money and expertise but it lacks the social ground for unique and cutting-edge medical innovations”, he said. ” Chinese traditions, which emphasizes respecting power, is more likely to doing repetitive and flexible work”.

He claimed that China is far from being a knock-out sweet power like the US.

Read: Beijing slams US for deporting Foreign learners

Observe Jeff Pao on Twitter at&nbsp, @jeffpao3

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Iran has everything to lose in direct war with Israel – Asia Times

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With Iran’s firing of some 180 ballistic missiles at Israel overnight, the Middle East is again on the brink of what would be a costly, ruinous regional war. Israel and its ally, the United States, shot down most of the missiles.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu immediately vowed to retaliate for the attack. He called it a “big mistake” that Iran will “pay for.”

The strike marked a dramatic shift in Iran’s calculations following weeks of escalating Israeli attacks on the leaders of its proxy groups, Hamas and Hezbollah, and their forces in both Gaza and Lebanon.

Iran has traditionally outsourced its fighting to Hezbollah and Hamas. It has been very much concerned about getting dragged into direct confrontation with Israel because of the ramifications for the ruling regime – namely the possible internal dissent and chaos that any war with Israel might generate.

When Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh was killed in Tehran in late July, Iran’s leaders said they would respond appropriately. They basically left it to Hezbollah to do that.

And as Israel intensified its military campaign against Hezbollah in Lebanon in recent weeks, another Iranian proxy group, the Houthi rebels in Yemen, claimed to have retaliated by launching missiles and drones at Israeli cities and US destroyers in the Red Sea. Israel responded with airstrikes on Yemen.

In this context, from the Iranian point of view, it looked like Iran was just sitting on the fence and not performing its leadership role in challenging Israel. So, to a large extent, Iran had to exert its role as the leader of the so-called “axis of resistance” and get into the fight.

Fighting Israel is very much a pillar of state identity in Iran. The Iranian political establishment is set up on the principle of challenging the United States and freeing Palestinian lands occupied by Israel.

Those things are ingrained in the Iranian state identity. So, if Iran doesn’t act on this principle, there’s a serious risk of undermining its own identity.

A delicate balancing act

Yet there are clearly serious risks to this type of direct attack by Iran.

Domestically, the Iranian political regime is suffering from a serious crisis of legitimacy. There have been numerous popular uprisings in Iran in recent years. These include the massive “Women, Life, Freedom” movement that erupted following the death of Mahsa Amini in police custody for allegedly not properly wearing her hijab.

There is also a major dissenting view in Iran that challenges the regime’s anti-US and anti-Israel state identity and its commitment to perpetual conflict with both countries.

So, the authorities in Iran have been concerned that direct confrontation with Israel and the US would unleash these internal dissenting voices and seriously threaten the regime’s survival. It’s this existential threat that has stopped Iran from acting on its principles.

In addition, Iran has a new president, Masoud Pezeshkian, who belongs to the reformist camp and has an agenda of improving Iran’s relations with the West. He has been talking about reviving the Iran nuclear deal with the international community, sending signals that Iran is prepared to talk with the Americans.

But the problem is the regional dynamics have completely changed since that deal was negotiated with the Obama administration in 2015. Iran has been a pariah state in recent years – and even more so since the conflict between Israel and Hamas began a year ago.

Since then, no Western country would deem it appropriate or politically expedient to engage in nuclear talks with Iran, with the aim of alleviating international sanctions on the regime. Not at a time when Iran is openly calling for the destruction of Israel, supporting Hezbollah and Hamas in their attacks on Israel, and now engaging in confrontations with Israel itself.

So the timing is awful for Pezeshkian’s agenda of repairing the damage to Iran’s global standing.

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian addressing the UN General Assembly last month. Photo: Pamela Smith / AP via The Conversation

Ultimately, though, it’s not the president who calls the shots in Iran – it is Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and the Supreme National Security Council who consider matters of war and peace and decide on the course of action. The supreme leader is also the head of state and appoints the head of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

The IRGC generals have been advocating for more serious and resolute action against Israel ever since the war in Gaza started. And it looks like the supreme leader has finally listened to this advice.

So, the regime has been maintaining a delicate balance of these factors: preserving Iran’s state identity and what it stands for in the region, and the need to manage internal dissent and ensure its survival.

In normal circumstances, it was easy for Iran to maintain this balance. It could manage its internal opponents through brutal force or appeasement and advocate an aggressive foreign policy in the region.

Now, the scales have tipped. From the Iranian perspective, Israel has been so brazen in its actions against its proxies that it just didn’t look right for Iran to continue sitting on the fence, not taking action.

As such, it has become more important for Iran to emphasize its anti-American, anti-Israel state identity and perhaps deal with an acceptable level of risk coming from a rise in internal dissent.

Where things go from here

With its attack on Israel, Iran is also prepared for another risk – direct retaliation from Israel and all-out war breaking out.

The conflict in the region is really going according to Netanyahu’s playbook. He has been advocating for hitting Iran and for the United States to target Iran. Now, Israel has the justification to retaliate against Iran and also drag the United States into the conflict.

Unfortunately, Iran is also now prepared to see the entire Persian Gulf get embroiled in the conflict because any retaliation by Israel and perhaps the United States would make US assets in the Persian Gulf, such as navy ships and commercial vessels, vulnerable to attacks by Iran or its allies. And that could have major implications for trade and security in the region.

This is the way things are heading. Iran would know that hitting Israel would invite Israeli retaliation and that this retaliation would likely happen with US backing. It seems Iran is prepared to bear the costs of this.

Shahram Akbarzadeh is convenor, Middle East Studies Forum (MESF), and deputy director (International) at the Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation, Deakin University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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Bangladesh takes a chance by embracing the US – Asia Times

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A convergence of political and commercial interests has emerged between a rapidly rising economy on the Bay of Bengal and US Indo-Pacific strategy. This convergence aims to deepen the American presence in the Indian Ocean Region amid a tectonic shift in international politics.

Under the leadership of the Dhaka interim government’s Chief Advisor Mohammad Yunus and with support from Washington by President Joe Biden, Bangladesh and the United States are poised to leverage each other’s potential for growth and expansion.

Bangladesh seeks funds to replenish its depleting foreign exchange reserves and recover from the previous Sheikh Hasina administration’s mismanagement while Washington is focused on strengthening its strategic foothold in the Indian Ocean.

The US played a significant role in supporting the movement that ousted Bangladesh’s fallen autocratic leader. Washington views the new administration under Yunus as an opportunity to enhance its presence in the Indo-Pacific, capitalizing on the Nobel laureate’s openness to greater collaboration with the West.

This evolving partnership between the leading global superpower and Bangladesh holds immense promise but also carries substantial risks.

The new administration, comprising professionals from prominent NGOs, may lack the statecraft, strategic vision and diplomatic finesse needed to navigate the complexities of international politics. Before pursuing the opportunities that this partnership offers, Bangladesh must urgently strengthen its political institutions and ensure economic stability.

Yunus’s interim administration faces significant internal and external challenges that must be tackled with cost-effective solutions. A failure to achieve stability risks further economic decline and political disorder – an outcome that would benefit China, which seeks to disrupt Bangladesh’s democratization process to protect its vested interests in the region.

Meanwhile, India, despite being a US ally, is working at cross-purposes. New Delhi strongly opposed the removal of its protégé Hasina through a US-backed student movement.

It’s the economy, stupid!

For Bangladesh to recover from 15 years of autocratic rule, exploitation and mismanagement, stability must be the top priority. Yunus must address the concerns of the Bangladeshi people, recognizing that economic and political stability are intertwined with the restoration of law and order. As the adage goes, “It’s the economy, stupid!”

The US-Bangladesh partnership has significant potential, especially as the removal of trade barriers and the easing of trade restrictions across the Indo-Pacific could lead to exponential growth.

Bangladesh’s inland and coastal regions, along with the Bay of Bengal, offer significant strategic value to the US Navy in its efforts to monitor the activities of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) including along the neighboring China-Myanmar Economic Corridor (CMEC).

Political developments in Bangladesh have also created a rift between the two largest democracies in the world – India and the United States. Though the two countries are aligned on many strategic issues, they are deeply divided on the Bangladesh question.

Ahead of the political upheaval in Dhaka on August 5, 2024, Washington and New Delhi diverged on their diplomatic approaches, each pursuing its own agenda without the other’s knowledge.

India supported Hasina’s autocratic government despite its human rights violations, while the US favored regime change, adhering to its democratic values at the risk of temporarily alienating a key regional ally.

This divergence had and has significant implications for regional power dynamics. The US could use its strategic position in Bangladesh to balance India’s obstinacy and China’s expansionism in the Bay of Bengal. With India no longer perceived as a benign hegemon by most Bangladeshis, new strong ties between Dhaka and Washington could provide crucial security guarantees for Bangladesh’s sovereignty.

However, this alliance may come with a price: Bangladesh might be required to support US interests in the region, particularly in the implementation of the Burma Act, which seeks to advance democratization in Myanmar amid a raging civil war.

Belt and Road

The US may also expect the Yunus administration to cooperate in curbing China’s growing presence in the region. However, many analysts doubt that Washington’s influence over the Yunus government will significantly affect China’s interests and operations in the Bay of Bengal.

The Chinese submarine base in the Bay of Bengal, built under the Belt and Road Initiative, serves both defensive and offensive purposes given its proximity to strategic chokepoints like the Strait of Malacca and India’s Andaman-Nicobar Islands.

Map: Wikipedia

China’s support for the Yunus government is based on its desire to protect its investments under the Belt and Road and maintain its strategic foothold in the region.

Bangladesh’s coastline is dotted with Belt and Road-funded infrastructure projects, such as the Karnaphuli Tunnel, Cox’s Bazar airport and the railways stretching to the Myanmar border.

These investments enhance the security perimeter of the PLA-Navy (PLAN), integrating the CMEC and coastal areas into China’s broader strategic defense.

India is unlikely to sit idly by as the US increases its influence in Bangladesh. Indian media and politicians have already begun to amplify allegations of US-engineered regime change and are waiting for an opportunity to reinstall an Indian-backed leadership in Dhaka.

Bangladesh’s concession to US demands, such as the installation of surveillance equipment and allowing naval warships near the Bay, could provoke a reaction from India.

Bangladesh is now officially recognized as a democratic country, reflecting not only regime type but also the widespread prevalence of democratic values among its population. This strong commitment to democracy provides Washington with the incentive to support the replacement of an authoritarian leader with a pro-Western democrat such as Yunus, steering the nation toward the liberal democratic order.

However, despite this optimistic turn, Bangladesh stands at a precarious crossroads. Its new democratic status and strategic value make it a key player in the Indo-Pacific but this also puts it in the crosshairs of great power competition.

The US-Bangladesh partnership may offer significant opportunities for economic growth and security. Yet it also comes with the risk of alienating India, a long-time regional power, and further provoking China, whose strategic interests are deeply entrenched in the Bay of Bengal.

In the coming years, Yunus’s administration will face the daunting task of balancing these competing interests. Bangladesh must carefully navigate these geopolitical currents to maintain its sovereignty and secure stability.

Whether the nation can manage the competing pressures from Washington, New Delhi and Beijing while fostering internal democratic growth will be the true test of its future.

Sheikh Rahman is a managing partner at Enertech International Inc in Dhaka.

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Iran strikes on Israel raise risk of a global war – Asia Times

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Iran fired at least 180 ballistic missiles at Israel on October 1, 2024, amplifying tensions in the Middle East that are increasingly marked by “escalation after escalation,” as United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres put it.

Iran’s attacks – which Israel largely deterred with its Iron Dome missile defense system, along with help from nearby US naval destroyers – followed Israel’s killing of Hassan Nasrallah, the longtime leader of the Tehran-backed Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, on September 27.

Hezbollah has been sending rockets into northern Israel since the start of the Gaza war, which began after Hamas and other militants invaded Israel on October 7, 2023, and killed nearly 1,200 people. Hezbollah’s rocket attacks have displaced around 70,000 people from their homes in northern Israel.

The Conversation US spoke with counterterrorism expert Javed Ali to better understand the complex history and dynamics that are fueling the intensifying conflict in the Middle East.

How much more dangerous has the Middle East become in recent weeks?

The Middle East is in much more volatile situation than it was even a year ago. This conflict has expanded far outside of fighting primarily between Israel and Hamas.

Now, Israel and Hezbollah have a conflict that has developed over the past year that appears more dangerous than the Israel-Hamas one. This involves the use of Israeli special operations units, which have operated clandestinely in Lebanon in small groups since November 2023.

In addition, Israel has been accused by Hezbollah of conducting unconventional warfare operations – like the exploding walkie-talkies and pagers – and launched hundreds of air and missile strikes in Lebanon over the past few weeks.

The combination of these operations has destroyed Hezbollah’s weapons caches and military infrastructure and killed several senior leaders in the group, including Hassan Nasrallah.

The human costs of these attacks is significant, as more than 1,000 people in Lebanon have died. Among this total, it is unclear how many of the dead or wounded are actually Hezbollah fighters.

Israel and Hezbollah last had a direct war in 2006, which lasted 34 days and killed over 1,500 people between Lebanese civilians and Hezbollah fighters. Since then, Israel and Hezbollah have been in a shadow war – but not with the same kind of intensity and daily pattern that we have seen in the post-October 7 landscape.

Now, the conflict has the potential to widen well outside the region, and even globally.

What does Iran have to do with the conflict between Israel and Hamas and Hezbollah?

Iran has said it fired the missiles into Israel as retaliation for attacks on Hezbollah, Hamas and the Iranian military.

A coalition of groups and organizations has now been labeled as Iran’s “Axis of Resistance.” Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khameini, and senior military commanders in the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, or the IRGC, have issued unifying guidance to all the different elements, whether it is Hamas in the Gaza Strip, the Houthi rebels in Yemen, Hezbollah in Lebanon, or Shia militias in Iraq and Syria.

People stand around a gray building at nighttime that appears damaged.
Israeli police officers inspect a damaged school building in the southern city of Gedera, following Iran’s barrage of missiles fired on October 1, 2024. Photo: Menahem Kahana / AFP via Getty Images / The Conversation

Before October 7, 2023, all of these groups were ideologically opposed to Israel, to a degree. But they were also fighting their own conflicts and were not rallying around supporting Hamas. Now, they have all become more active around a common goal of destroying Israel.

Iran and Hezbollah, in particular, have a deep relationship, dating back to the Iranian Revolution in 1979 and the creation of the Islamic Republic of Iran.

In 1982, Israel invaded southern Lebanon in order to thwart cross-border attacks the Palestinian Liberation Organization and other Palestinian groups were launching into Israel. The newly formed Iranian IRGC sent advisers and trainers to southern Lebanon to work with like-minded Lebanese Shiite militants who were already fighting in Lebanon’s civil war.

They wanted to fight against the Israeli military and elements of the multinational force comprised of US, French and other Western troops that were originally sent as peacekeepers to put an end to the fighting.

How does Hezbollah’s history help explain its operations today?

The relationships between these Iranian experts and Lebanese militants during Lebanon’s 15-year civil war led to the formation of Hezbollah as a small, clandestine group in 1982.

During the following few years, Hezbollah launched a brutal campaign of terrorist attacks against US, French and other Western interests in Lebanon. The group, then known as Islamic Jihad, first attacked the US embassy in Beirut on April 18, 1983.

That attack killed 52 Lebanese and American embassy employees. However, at the time, US intelligence personnel and other security experts were not clear who was responsible for the embassy bombing. And given this lack of understanding and insight on Hezbollah as an emerging terrorist threat, the group aimed even higher later in 1983.

Following the embassy attack, Hezbollah carried out the October 1983 Marine barracks bombing that killed 241 US service personnel. Before the 9/11 attacks, this was the biggest single act of international terrorism against the US.

Hezbollah was also responsible for the kidnapping and murder of American citizens, including William Buckley, the CIA station chief for Beirut. And it carried out airplane hijackings, include the infamous TWA 847 incident in 1985, in which a U.S. Navy diver was murdered.

So, Hezbollah has a long history of regional and global terrorism.

Within Lebanon, Hezbollah is a kind of parallel government to Lebanon. The Lebanese government has allowed Hezbollah to be this state within a state, but they don’t collaborate on military operations. Currently, the Lebanese military is not responding to Israel’s attacks on Lebanon. This shows how dominant of a force Hezbollah has become.

How damaging are Israel’s attacks on Hezbollah?

Hezbollah has clearly taken losses in fighters, but Hezbollah is a far bigger group than Hamas and operates on a much bigger physical territory across Lebanon.

It has far more inventory of advanced weapons than Hamas ever did, and a large fighting force that includes 40,000 to 50,000 regular forces organized into a conventional military structure. It also has 150,000 to 200,000 rockets, drones and missiles of varying range.

It operates a dangerous global terrorist unit known as the External Security Organization that has attacked Israeli and Jewish interests in the 1990s in Argentina and Jewish tourists in 2012 in Bulgaria.

The Israeli military assesses they have destroyed at least half of Hezbollah’s existing weapons stockpile, based on the volume and intensity of their operations over the past few weeks. If true, this, would present a serious challenge to Hezbollah’s long-term operational capability that took decades to acquire.

What security risks does this evolving conflict present for the US?

Looking at how Hezbollah demonstrated these capabilities over a 40-year stretch of time, and based now on how Israel has hit the militant group, it would not be a stretch to speculate that Hezbollah has ordered or is considering some kind of terrorist attack far outside the region – similar to what the group did in Argentina in 1992 and 1994.

What that plot would like look, how many people would be involved, and the possible target of any such attack are not clear.

Hezbollah’s leaders have said that they blame Israel for the attacks on it. About a week before Nasrallah’s death, he said that Israel’s exploding pager and walkie-talkie operations in Lebanon were a “declaration of war” and the “the enemy had crossed all red lines.”

Since then, Hezbollah has remained defiant, in spite of the significant losses the group has sustained by Israel these past few weeks. Questions also remain about how Hezbollah’s leadership will likewise hold the US responsible for Israel’s actions.

And if so, would that mean a return to the type of terrorism that Hezbollah inflicted on US interests in the region in the 1980s? As recent events have shown, the world is facing a dangerous and volatile security environment in the Middle East.

Javed Ali is associate professor of practice of public policy, University of Michigan

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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US Navy’s submarine program full of gaping holes – Asia Times

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The US Navy’s Columbia-class nuclear ballistic missile submarine (SSBN) program is perilously behind schedule, raising concerns about the service’s ability to replace aging Ohio-class SSBNs on time to maintain nuclear deterrence amid rising tensions with China.

Last month, the US Government Accountability Office (GAO) released a report saying that the Columbia-class program faces significant challenges, including delays, cost overruns and performance risks that jeopardize its timeline.

The first Columbia SSBN was initially planned for delivery by April 2027 but is now expected between October 2028 and February 2029, potentially affecting its planned availability for operations in 2030, according to the GAO report.

It also points out that persistent problems like subpar construction performance, delays in work instructions and material shortages have caused significant cost overruns in the hundreds of millions of dollars.

The GAO report says that the Columbia-class shipbuilder, Electric Boat, has consistently fallen short of cost and schedule targets and warns that the contractor’s optimistic recovery plan may be unrealistic.

It also says that the US Navy’s US$2.6 billion investment in the submarine supplier base, meant to accelerate production, lacks consistent performance tracking, raising concerns about its effectiveness.

The report says that despite efforts to mitigate these problems, further risks in final assembly and testing could exacerbate delays and costs. The GAO report mentions that without better oversight and revised cost estimates, the US Navy may face operational gaps in its nuclear deterrence strategy, increasing reliance on aging Ohio-class SSBNs whose service lives may now need risky extensions.

A US Congressional Research Service (CRS) report from last month says that the delays in the construction of the Columbia-class SSBNs stem from multiple factors, including difficulties in assembling the boat’s modules, workforce shortages at shipyards and supply chain issues, particularly with critical components like turbine generators and the bow dome.

The think tank report notes that these parts, supplied by subcontractors such as Northrop Grumman, arrived late, further straining the schedule.

CRS says the tight timeline for constructing the Columbia-class SSBNs, exacerbated by the need to concurrently build Virginia-class nuclear attack submarines (SSN), has also exposed industrial base challenges. It notes that with US shipyards struggling to meet the demands of both programs, questions are arising regarding the ability to maintain on-time deliveries without sacrificing quality.

On that score, USNI reported last month that Newport News Shipbuilding alerted the US Department of Justice (DOJ) about suspected faulty welds in submarines and aircraft carriers, potentially made intentionally.

USNI says that the shipbuilder informed the US Navy that certain welds in both new construction and in-service vessels did not adhere to proper procedures, according to a memo from Assistant Secretary of the US Navy Nickolas Guertin.

The source says that the US Navy is investigating the extent of the issue, with early findings suggesting that some welders knowingly violated welding protocols. It mentions that Newport News, a key builder of Virginia- and Columbia-class submarines and Ford-class aircraft carriers, discovered the problem through internal quality assurance measures.

The company has claimed its workers had no malicious intent and has taken immediate corrective action, according to the USNI report. It notes that US lawmakers, led by the House Armed Services Committee, have launched an investigation demanding answers from the US Department of Defense (DOD) about the safety risks posed to US Navy sailors.

USNI mentions that the full scope of the faulty welds is still under evaluation, with re-inspections of the affected vessels expected to continue into October. It notes that the issue recalls previous welding controversies at the shipyard, including a similar investigation in the 2000s.

The CRS report mentions that the potential for cost overruns adds another layer of complexity to the skyrocketing costs of the Columbia-class SSBNs. It says procurement costs for the first boat are now estimated at $15.2 billion, partly due to design and engineering expenses.

The report also states that any further delays could impact the US Navy’s strategic deterrence capabilities​, as it is necessary to ensure that the Columbia-class SSBNs can replace Ohio-class SSBNs on schedule.

These issues may be emblematic of more significant problems in the US submarine production base’s maintenance of its strategic edge amid China’s rising threat. In a 2024 American Affairs article, Jerry Hendrix notes that the US submarine fleet has dwindled from its Cold War peak of 140 nuclear-powered submarines to just 67 today, with only 49 classified as SSNs.

Due to a three-year maintenance backlog, Hendrix points out that nearly a third of these vessels are non-operational. He also says that the US Navy’s shipbuilding partners have struggled to ramp up production post-Covid, with only one new SSN planned for the fiscal year 2025.

Hendrix mentions that the submarine industrial base’s decline, exacerbated by decisions made in the 1990s to close several vital shipyards, has left the US with insufficient drydock and maintenance capacity.

In contrast to the US, Sarah Kirchberger mentions in a September 2023 China Maritime Studies Institute (CMSI) report that China’s submarine industrial base, a key component of its naval modernization, has made significant advancements through state-led innovation focused on research and development (R&D) and upgrading shipbuilding infrastructure.

Kirchberger says that the Bohai, Wuchang and Jiangnan shipyards have modernized to meet China’s growing demand for nuclear and conventional submarines. However, she notes that despite substantial investments, weaknesses persist, particularly in propulsion systems, submarine quieting technologies and air-independent propulsion (AIP) capabilities.

To address these gaps, she notes China has leveraged political and economic ties with Russia, seeking access to advanced undersea technologies. While Kirchberger notes that China’s industrial base boasts impressive infrastructure, its reliance on foreign technology, inefficiencies caused by state monopolies, and technical shortcomings in critical subsystems hinder its ability to fully match the capabilities of more established submarine-producing nations such as Russia and the US.

Nevertheless, Kirchberger says that China’s aggressive shipbuilding trajectory, bolstered by substantial state financing, positions it as a formidable naval power with ongoing efforts to close remaining technological gaps.

Asia Times has noted that China aims to match or surpass the US in undersea warfare capabilities, with its submarine program moving faster than the US’s.

While China seeks to have a quantitative edge over the US in submarines, taking production shortcuts and a lack of leadership and knowledge in its submarine program, coupled with deeply entrenched corruption in its defense industries, may lead to setbacks such as the purported pier-side sinking of its latest Zhou-class SSN.

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Indian cosmology, Industry 4.0 and the coming end of work – Asia Times

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India’s ancient sages believed that a balanced society relies on the contribution of four “varnas”, generic categories representing workers, merchants, protectors, and teachers. When one of the four varnas is neglected or sidelined, society becomes conflicted and fails to reach its full potential.

The varna concept later devolved into a rigid caste system (jāti), used for political oppression, but its original framework remains valuable for understanding the modern world. The varna concept suggests that communism failed because it sidelined the merchants, and that capitalism is failing because it sidelines the workers.

Scholars have drawn parallels between the varna concept and Marxism, equating class struggle with “caste struggle.” They equate workers and merchants in the varna concept with labor and capital in Marxism. However, the four categories of the varna concept offer a more nuanced view of society and have a cosmological basis.

Varna is part of an ancient Vedic prophesy. The four varnas take turns leading society. Each varna stage advances the human condition to the next level until it reaches a new spiritual age. The prophesy is comparable to the Second Coming in Abrahamic traditions. Both offer a vista to a better world to come.

But the true value of the varna system today is that it offers a different lens for looking at the contemporary world with its many apparent contradictions, complexities, and conflicts, including the seemingly intractable conflict between the US and China.

Varna

The concept of varna was first mentioned in the Vedas around 1500 BCE. The ancient sages observed that people naturally gravitate toward specific roles within society. They classified these roles into four generic types or varnas: merchants, workers, protectors, and teachers.

Central to the varna concept is the idea that humanity moves through cycles in which each varna plays a leading role in advancing civilization, from barbarism to enlightenment. Once this cycle is completed, it starts again, reflecting the Vedic view of time as cyclical.

The four varnas cover all social human activity and are interdependent. All four are essential to a functioning society, but they hold distinct worldviews and have different desires, needs, and values.

– Teachers/Spiritual Seekers (Vipra): Enlighten others by valuing the mind, cultivating spiritual and scientific knowledge, and creating laws enforced by warriors.

– Warriors/Protectors (Kshatriya): Driven by competition, they value strength and valor, safeguarding society through order and security.

– Merchants/Entrepreneurs (Vaeshya): Skilled in managing resources, they advance society’s material prosperity.

– Workers (Sudra): Focused on practical labor, empathetic with others. They value security, but given their numbers, they can bring the system down if their needs are not met.

Varnas can overlap in each individual. Most people have traits of two or more varna types. A merchant type can also have a spiritual inclination, and a worker type can also have a merchant impulse. But one of the four varnas typically predominates in each individual.

The malignant caste system that developed in later centuries was the result of politics and human vanity. In the words of modern spiritual teacher Sadhguru, things went wrong “when the goldsmith started to feel superior to the blacksmith.” The caste system transformed the varnas from psychological profiles to lineages.

Modern applications

Despite the varna concept being tainted by centuries of abuse, it has found modern, constructive applications.

Australian scholars Peter Hayward and Joseph Voros developed the Sarkar Game, a role-playing game that is used in corporate training programs. Participants take turns assuming the role of one of the four varnas. This fosters empathy and understanding by stepping into the perspectives of others.

The game, created in collaboration with Professor Sohail Inayatullah, Chair in Futures Studies at UNESCO, helps participants navigate social dynamics and problematic hierarchies. When people adopt different varna roles, they make more informed decisions that address the concerns of all parties.

The Sarkar Game is named after Indian spiritual teacher Prabhat Ranjan Sarkar (1921-1990), founder of the socio-spiritual PROUT movement. PROUT promotes an all-encompassing social program based on the varna cycle, emphasizing physical, educational, cultural, and spiritual well-being.

Professor Inayatullah is one of PROUT’s most prominent proponents.

Varna and futurist Lawrence Taub

Varna is also central to the work of American futurist and macrohistorian Lawrence Taub (1936-2016). Taub made the daring claim that the Varna cycle can be mapped to actual (linear) human history.

Taub based his claim on the specific characteristics of the four varnas: their worldviews, ruling elites, sources of power, etc. He argued that one of the four varnas was predominant in specific cultural regions throughout human history up to the present time.   

In Taub’s model, the first Spiritual Age, Satyayuga I, was the prehistoric, animistic period. This age was global, not confined to specific regions. People believed that animals, plants, rivers, and mountains were imbued with a spiritual essence. Shaman leaders mediated the relationship between humans and nature.

The Spiritual Age was followed by the Warrior Age, the age of heroic conquest. It introduced the horrors of large-scale war but also advanced the human condition. Warrior kings Constantine and Ashoka spread Christian and Buddhist spiritual consciousness around the world.

The subsequent Merchant Age began in Europe in the early 17th century. It was marked by the Dutch Revolt against the Spanish occupiers. The Dutch Republic was ruled by merchants. They opened the world’s first stock exchange and created the Duch East-India Company, the first chartered, globe-spanning multinational trading company.

The current Worker Age began in the late 19th century when the Industrial Revolution gathered steam. Workers formed unions to fight for better working conditions, organizing strikes to press their demands. Solidarity was their most potent weapon and they gradually made progress.

In the 20th century, most industrialized countries introduced free basic education and social welfare programs. Even the US, the bulwark of capitalism, created a social safety net. President Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society introduced Medicare for the elderly and Medicaid for the vulnerable.

Merchant fightback

Transitions between varna stages are marked by struggle. The ongoing shift from the Merchant Age to the Worker Age is no exception. The merchants, who retained an outsized influence on society, used a retrograde ideology, neoliberalism, in an attempt to reverse the gains of the workers.

In the 1980s, US President Ronald Reagan and British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher embraced neoliberalism. They called for a reduction of the role of government in the economy, deregulation, privatization, free markets, and reducing the so-called welfare state.

Neoliberalism was a partial return to the laissez-faire capitalism of the 19th century. The merchants prioritized profits over people and moved factories to low-income countries. They deindustrialized a large part of the US and alienated millions of workers.  

Moreover, the American economy became increasingly financialized. Everything from real estate and sports franchises to art objects were traded like commodities. Money became an asset to make more money rather than to produce goods or services. The concentration of wealth increased and income disparity returned to levels not seen since the 19th century.

Ironically, billionaire entrepreneur Donald Trump was the first president to seriously challenge the neoliberal power structure. While his supporters were mostly workers, Trump had a merchant worldview. As president, he mostly adhered to the neoliberal agenda of his predecessors but gave neoliberalism a nationalistic twist.

Neoliberalism opened up the world economy and stimulated global trade, but it had a fundamental flaw. Antithetical to government interference in the economy, it prevented the country from setting national goals to deal with a changing world. The problems caused by a lack of planning and foresight became apparent in the first decades of the 21st century.

Instead of developing a long-term vision, the US government simply reacted ad hoc to global challenges. It resorted to sanctions, tariffs, subsidies for vulnerable domestic industries, and the weaponization of the dollar. The latter had the opposite of its intended effect, resulting in a global movement to de-dollarize bilateral trade.

China’s market reforms

The start of the neoliberal era coincided with China’s market reforms under Deng Xiaoping. Deng opened the country to foreign investment and allowed commerce to flourish. Communism under Mao Zedong had sidelined the merchants, but Deng, putting pragmatism over ideology, reintegrated the merchants into Chinese society.

As was the case in Russia, China’s communism movement was a revolt against the merchants, both domestic and foreign (neo) colonialists who had plundered China for a century. Led by the intelligentsia (vipras), the communist revolution was widely supported by the workers and the warriors.

Deng’s reform, which prioritized outcomes over ideology, transformed China into a global economic powerhouse. Using 5, 10, and even 50-year plans, the Chinese economy grew at breathtaking speed. The goal was Xiaokang or the creation of a “moderately prosperous society.”

Deng’s market reforms liberalized the economy, but the Communist Party retained control, in part to prevent the merchants from building a political power base and coopting government policy.

When tech billionaire Jack Ma, founder of e-commerce giant Alibaba, questioned the economic policies of the Chinese government, the government cut him down to size to let him know who is in charge.

Other billionaires got the message. Zhong Shanshan, the billionaire founder of a bottled water company, set up the “Common Prosperity Fund.” Tech giants Tencent, Alibaba, and other big companies made large contributions to the fund or launched similar initiatives in the name of “common prosperity.”

China’s rise was spectacular. The Chinese middle class today is the largest in the world by far. But its rise was predictable. In the 1980s, Japan virtually destroyed the Western consumer electronics industry and the Western automobile industry came close to meeting the same fate, rescued only by import restrictions.

China, ten times larger than Japan, applied a similar formula. Taub calls it teamwork capitalism informed by the worker worldview. He wrote: “Both value society (the State) over the individual. They stress conformity, group-mindedness, linkage, cooperation, a collective attitude, sensitivity to others, and a desire to live securely.”

The end of work

Worker varna qualities will play a key role in the Fourth Industrial, the next stage of technological development. Industry 4.0 combines multiple technologies and the social sciences to integrate Industry 4.0 into daily life. China is leading in most of the technologies that are crucial to the Fourth Industrial Revolution.

Barring unforeseen circumstances, China’s economic and technological influence in the world is likely to increase. For the US to keep up, it needs a plan. The same applies to the rudderless EU, like the US taken over by neoliberals. Without a plan or destination, the ship of state is lost at sea, at the mercy of the force of history.

Taub warns against the West imitating China. The Worker Age is the shortest of the four varna ages and will be superseded by the new Spiritual Age, Satyayuga II. Harbingers of this new era are the growing interest in yoga, meditation, mindfulness and ecology.

Taub argues that several traits cultivated during the merchant era – such as a well-developed ego and individualism – were out of step with the Worker Age, but these merchant traits will align more closely with Satyayuga II than the Confucian-inspired emphasis on teamwork and prioritizing society over the individual.

This may be true but the world must first navigate the Fourth Industrial Revolution. Industry 4.0 will gradually lead to the end of most work and transform society. China leads this transition and has the economies of scale to set global standards. It is bound to play a key role in mediating the transition to Setyayuga II.

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