Judging from how the mainstream media has characterized the legacy of Barack Obama so far, the outgoing president will be most remembered for his many rousing aspirational speeches and well-timed shows of emotion.

His talent as a persuasive public communicator and the strength of his personal brand, bolstered by years of apple-shining from liberal magazines and newspapers, has been Obama’s most valuable asset.

This perception of Obama that has been propagated from the top, the view that he is essentially a benevolent figure with deep integrity or the personification of a modern liberal-statesmen, is a stunning smokescreen.

The contradiction between the high-minded rhetoric of the president in contrast to the actual policies pursued by his administration has been stark and utterly scandalous.

To hear Obama wax poetic about ‘the politics of hope’ and ‘how ordinary Americans can steer change’ feels deeply perverse coming from a figure that has institutionalized a vast, unaccountable permanent warfare state.

In the face of Obama’s global covert assassinate program, his numerous secret wars without congressional approval, a mass electronic surveillance capability unprecedented in history, the speeches reveal themselves as little more than banal platitudes and vapid sloganeering.

As the sun sets on Obama’s presidency, to say the press has given him a pass is a grand understatement. Some outlets have occasionally run criticism of Obama’s drone policies or inconvenient relationship with Saudi Arabia.

Other voices invert reality altogether, chastising Obama for his reluctance to militarily engage Syria, despite the US dropping over 12,000 bombs on the country in 2016 alone.

Contrary to his predecessor, Obama had a firmer grasp on the political risks inherent in the large-scale deployment of US troops in sustained military campaigns, but his strategic objectives differed little and his belief in American exceptionalism was total.

Rather than ‘shock and awe’, Obama proffered ‘leading from behind’, culminating in NATO support and air power for insurgents that toppled the Libyan government on the pretext of defending human rights, turning the country into a cauldron of rival fiefdoms and lawlessness.

The Obama administration and the CIA fuelled a proxy war on Syria with arms and training for insurgents, many of whom took up arms with ISIS or al-Qaeda affiliated groups. The US military’s presence in Syria and support for non-state actors abjectly violates international law and John Kerry’s leaked comments make clear how the administration cynically leveraged the threat of ISIS against the Syrian government.

Not only did Obama fail in his promise to close the Guantanamo Bay torture facility, he effectively replaced enhanced interrogation with an unaccountable covert assassination complex, endowing himself with the roles of judge, jury, and executioner.

By virtue of his suave and benevolent public persona, top-tier entertainers and figures of the liberal intelligentsia were largely willing to acquiesce to the precedent set by Obama’s unrestrained executive powers, exercised in near-complete secrecy.

They believed Obama would use the entrenched military and surveillance capacities of the US government judiciously. They swallowed the Democrats’ rhetoric of social inclusion and focused their political energies largely on identity issues.

Liberal figures didn’t protest against the president’s ability to spy on countless Americans suspected of no crime, nor did they organise against the president’s extrajudicial assassinations of American citizens and non-Americans without trial or due process.

Liberals hardly spoke out against the thousands of civilians killed by Obama’s drone bombings. Oddly enough, many seemed more outraged at Trump’s campaign rhetoric against Muslims and Mexicans than the reality of President Obama engaging in military hostilities against seven Muslim countries and deporting more people than any president in history.

Frankly, far too many Americans have been utter cowards in the face of the outgoing Democratic presidency. Obama will soon leave office as the only president in American history to serve two complete terms at war.

Despite his tense relationship with the Israeli prime minister and token opposition to the expansion of settlements, Obama signed the single largest pledge of bilateral military assistance to Israel in history, enabling the cancerous Israeli occupation and further brutalization of Palestinians.

As the Saudi military ceaselessly bombarded towns and cities across impoverished Yemen, the Arab world’s poorest country, in a botched attempt to reinstall an ousted proxy government, the Obama administration offered muted criticism and a $115 billion arms deal.

Obama’s administration has in fact brokered more arms sales than other since the second world war. And despite campaigning on the building ‘the most transparent administration in history’, he has waged a war against whistleblowers and official leakers, invoking the 1917 Espionage Act more than all previous presidents combined.

Obama spoke of his dramatic commitment to building a nuclear weapons-free world on the campaign trail. Once in office, he committed the country to a trillion-dollar modernization of US nuclear production facilities and weapons, including warheads with adjustable yields that, according to the New York Times, make the weapons “more tempting to use”.

One of the most consequential international developments to occur under Obama’s watch was the deterioration of US-Russia relations and the revival of Cold War antagonisms, marked by the covert American role in the 2014 coup in Ukraine that brought to power a crude, corrupt and pervasively anti-Russian regime. 

The largest military build-up on Russia’s borders since the second world war has unfolded under Obama’s watch, and the White House has moved in lock-step with the US intelligence community to propagate the anti-Russian line that has now captured American politics.

His administration’s pivot to Asia policy aimed to transfer 60 percent of the US naval presence to the Asia Pacific region by 2020, while the now-botched Trans-Pacific Partnership sought to – in the words of Senator Charles E. Schumer – “lure” other countries “away from China”.

On the domestic front, there have hardly been any clear-cut achievements for President Obama. He has overseen an obscene transfer of wealth from the middle class to the billionaire class, becoming the first two-term presidency that has failed to post a 3% GDP growth on an annualized basis over two terms.

The much-touted streak of job recovery rests on the proliferation of insecure part-time and temporary jobs with low protections characteristic of the gig economy, while the share of workers in temporary jobs has risen from 10.7 percent to 15.8 percent under his watch.

Wall Street banks hoarded funds fueled by the quantitative easing policies of the Federal Reserve to triple the size of stock values. Corporate profits reached an 85-year peak under Obama while the total compensation of employees’ wages and salaries slipped to levels last recorded in 1929. The wealth of the richest 400 Americans increased from $1.57 trillion in 2008 to $2.4 trillion in 2016.

The market-driven Affordable Care Act, Obama’s primary domestic initiative, did extend medical coverage to segments of American society, while millions of others were forced to pay higher premiums for substandard care. This shifted health care costs from employers and the state to working individuals in a move that effectively amounts to a bailout for private insurers.

And finally, there is the obscene proliferation of police brutality that has unfolded under Obama’s watch, with offending officers rarely held to account for their actions. African-American males were found to be nine times more likely to be killed by police officers in 2015 than white men of the same age.

But despite Obama’s troubled and deeply hypocritical track record, he remains a figure that many Americans continue to admire and respect, especially as the country moves rapidly toward a new and highly divisive political era.

A great deal of Americans, especially those in African-American communities, desperately and sincerely want to believe in the hope that Obama inspired in them. Unfortunately, Obama’s key achievement has proven to be his skillful usurpation of progressive rhetoric in the interest of an extreme militaristic and pro-corporate political agenda.

While many fear the spectre of Donald Trump’s incoming presidency and the new forms of authoritarianism and state violence that will inevitably accompany it, none should forget that it was President Obama who set the precedent for the extreme executive authority that President Trump will soon enjoy.

Park has governed high-handedly with a secretive style of leadership that has stoked public curiosity in her closely guarded personal life. She campaigned on reducing income inequality and expanding welfare but emerged adrift as a bland center-right defender of the status quo.

She came to power in early 2013, supported at the ballot box by mainly senior citizens who saw her as channeling the legacy of her late father, the military dictator Park Chung-hee, often associated with modernization, rapid growth and authoritarianism.

The scandal that precipitated Park’s spectacular downfall is rooted in allegations that her longtime personal friend and confidant, Choi Soon-sil, exerted an inordinate amount of influence over government policies, edited the president’s speeches and even influenced government appointments.

Choi, a civilian with no security clearance, was found to illegally possess confidential government documents. Park also personally lobbied corporations like Samsung and Hyundai to make massive financial contributions to charitable organisations controlled by Choi.

Adding to the salaciousness, Korean media reports claim Choi’s father was a spiritual mentor to Park because of his alleged ability to communicate with the spirit of her assassinated mother and induce trance-like experiences.

Relations with North Korea have reached their nadir under her hawkish foreign policy, symbolized by the closure of the Kaesong Industrial Complex and the suspension of all inter-Korean cooperation and channels for emergency communication between north and south.

She has brought lawsuits for defamation against journalists and engineered the dissolution of the far-left United Progressive Party, ousting elected parliamentarians on the pretext that the party was intent on realizing North Korean-style socialism, when in actuality they held critical views of US military presence in their country and advocated détente with Pyongyang.

Park’s primary foreign policy overture was an extended charm offensive to the Chinese leadership in an attempt to persuade President Xi Jinping to cooperate more fully with Seoul on pressuring North Korea over its nuclear program.

China responded by initially strengthening ties with South Korea, but relations have soured considerably after Seoul agreed to deploy the sophisticated American missile defense system known as Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) on its territory.

Despite mass public opposition inside South Korea against THAAD deployment, Seoul’s conservative establishment says the system will counter Pyongyang’s nuclear ambitions. China, wary of American military presence near its borders, believes it is the true target of the missile defense system and says the move would impede its security interests.

From mishandling the government’s response to a capsized ferry that killed hundreds to a row about whitewashing her father’s legacy in school textbooks, Park’s advocacy of THAAD and her pro-American security orientation has made her deeply unpopular at home while hindering trust and cooperation with China, her country’s biggest trading partner.

After the impeachment vote, Park’s powers were suspended and Hwang Kyo-ahn, her staunch ally and prime minister, was made the acting president. The country’s Constitutional Court must now consider whether to endorse Park’s impeachment, a process which could still take months.

Park has indicated that she would fight the impeachment process, making no mention of a voluntary resignation. Her removal now requires six of the nine Constitutional Court judges, at least six of which were appointed by Park or her predecessor, Lee Myung-bak.

Should the Constitutional Court judges vote in favour of her impeachment, a new presidential election will be held within 60 days. Park will attempt to survive the ruling of the country’s highest judiciary and see out her term, though the results of the impeachment vote in the assembly indicate that nearly half of the 128 lawmakers in her party oppose her.

Park’s impeachment comes at a time of great uncertainty about the incoming Trump administration and its stance on North Korea and the future of the US-South Korea military alliance. Should the ruling conservative party be thrust into a new presidential election, it will attempt to distance itself from Park, though after two consecutive unpopular administrations, this will be a hard sell to voters.

In many ways, the street protests calling for Park’s resignation – the largest in the country’s history with over 1.7 million in attendance –  is a rejection not of a singular figure, but of the conservative establishment that has governed for most of the pre- and post-democracy period and its close relationship with the elite business conglomerates that dominate the South Korean economy.

Polls indicate that Moon Jae-in, opposition leader with the Democratic Party, is the most popular presidential contender. The ascension of the liberal opposition, which has traditionally favored dialogue and economic cooperation with Pyongyang, could have a positive effect on inter-Korean relations.

Given the enormous controversy around THAAD, a liberal administration could build a strong electoral platform in opposition to its deployment, especially if the Trump administration pressures the South Korean government for preferential trade arrangements or hard compensation for US military expenditure in South Korea.

There is much speculation that Ban Ki-moon, whose term as UN Secretary General expires in January 2017, will run, though he has yet to confirm or deny his intentions. This would be a formidable challenge for the opposition due to Ban’s stature and prestige as a global diplomatic figure, widely viewed among Koreans as having experience and integrity.

Ban is seen as representing a continuity of the incumbent party’s policies and would likely side with Park’s conservatives should he run. Whatever the outcome, it is difficult to imagine a potential Ban Ki-moon presidency as anything other than the caretaking of a stale political order. In an age of electoral upsets for establishment parties, the movement that has coalesced in opposition to Park may still make its mark at the ballot box.

The outcome of strangest and most consequential election cycle in recent American history will soon be upon us. Regardless of who becomes the next president, this election will forever be synonymous with the rogue candidacy of Donald Trump and the demographic shifts that have emboldened the right.

Though it may be a close election, it is widely presumed that public antipathy towards Trump – the first major party candidate who is near-universally opposed by both major parties – will tilt the odds in Hillary Clinton’s favour. Nonetheless, Trump’s support base of primarily white, blue-collar Americans will be a major factor for the political establishment to contend with in the years ahead.

These voters are frustrated by their economic marginalisation wrought by neoliberal trade deals and economic policies, and are contemptuous of traditional political elite, their internationalism and liberal identity politics. For these voters, fear of immigration is entwined with the precarity of being working class, their troubling prejudices notwithstanding.

Economic disempowerment and political disenfranchisement have accelerated under President Obama, to the detriment of the American middle class. White, blue-collar Americans have witnessed the offshoring of their jobs and the erosion of their status in society, and Trump has masterfully stroked their resentment and discontent by playing on their fears of Muslims, immigrants and minorities.

Trump’s views often contain unusual contradictions and seem to be delivered impromptu. What remains consistent are his authoritarian views on crime and justice, vows to close the borders to refugees, Muslims and economic migrants, scepticism of overseas ‘democracy promotion’ and America’s role in international alliances, foreign policy views both isolationist and belligerent and of course, his distinctive megalomaniacal hubris.

Trump’s real problem with the Washington establishment is that he isn’t part of it. His campaign represents an insurgent faction of the oligarchical class that aims to displace and replace the standing political elites. Bipartisan opposition to Trump is grounded in the belief that he would be an unreliable proxy and a liability, someone too narrow and unpredictable to manage the common affairs of the ruling class and the US deep state.

Moreover, the US establishment is not interested in being led by such a contentious figure, who would draw protest and public opposition in a way that more conventional establishment candidates largely do not. For example, Trump’s rhetoric on immigration seems to engender more public outrage than the immigration policy under Obama, who has deported more people than any other president in history.

That being said, Hillary Clinton is a more dangerous candidate in many ways. Trump understands that the political system is rigged and theeconomy is oriented to serve various elite interests, a message that resonates across the political spectrum, even with anti-Trump segments of the electorate. As a hated political outsider not tied directly into the power and the money structure of the political system, there would be no shortage of gridlock and checks on the authority wielded by Trump in the unlikely event of his presidency.

By contrast, Clinton wields enormous political influence inside the corridors of political and corporate power through personal relationships and connections. Policy and legislation shaped by donor money, lobbyist groups and special interests have been a hallmark of the Clintons’ time in public office. The very fact that she is standing for office while being investigated by the FBI, having committed actions that would have ended the careers of other politicians and government employees, speaks for itself.

It has been reported by various sources that the FBI’s recent decision to reopen the investigation into the Clinton email scandal less than two weeks before election day has been motivated by an internal backlash within the agency’s rank and file, forcing FBI director James Comey’s hand as a means of addressing internal critics who believe he buried the Clinton probe for political reasons.

Clinton’s email scandal is not the real issue. She has spent her political career ruthlessly advancing the interests of high finance, the military industrial complex and corporate America, with dramatic repercussions for minorities and the marginalised inside the United States, and the civilian populations of countries targeted for US military intervention and destabilization during the her time as an influential first lady, senator and secretary of state.

Clinton has spent her long career advocating hawkish US military supremacy and banking deregulation, expanding the private prison industry to the detriment of impoverished African-American communities, dismantling the social safety net that marginalized families rely on, and enabling the consolidation of corporate power through secretive trade agreements. On the campaign trail, she has characterised her work as advancing the interests of women and families.

The Clinton campaign has repeatedly evoked the historic struggle for civil rights into a aspirational rhetoric of ‘breaking glass ceilings’ in the interest of a faux-feminism which prioritizes the equal opportunities of women to lead the nation’s highest office, while at once tone-deaf to the consequences faced by women and families on the receiving end of executive policies. The Democratic Party has become a parody of moral posturing, self-relishing its candidates with rhetoric that has no connection with policies in reality.

It is the party of establishment insiders and corporate donors who openly engineer the presidential nomination process to favour their preferred candidate by virtue of the undemocratic super-delegate system. Bernie Sanders, whose campaign inspired millions of Americans for good reason, has proven himself to be tepid and cowardly in the face of practices that have proven beyond doubt that the Democratic Party establishment conspired against him.

Bernie’s campaign centred around a rather modest, comparatively tame centre-left progressive platform that did not seriously question US militarism and the values of American exceptionalism. For the Democratic Party at large, the Sanders campaign represented a concession too far. The Clinton campaign even had the impudence to directly hire disgraced Democratic chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz after leaked emails exposed her partisanship.

Rather than addressing the political substance of revelations uncovered by WikiLeaks, the Clinton campaign, backed by Obama administration officials, has reverted to neo-McCarthyism by labelling opposition as surrogates of Russia, explicitly accusing Moscow of meddling in the US election process. Accusations of Russian interference without accompanying evidence are at best a short-sighted means of deflecting responsibility for the corrupt actions of the Clinton campaign and Democratic Party insiders.

The next American president will have to confront the realities of strained relations with Russia. Clinton is known for her public enmity toward Russian President Vladimir Putin and would at best perpetuate the status quo of mutual distrust and limited cooperation. At worst, her policies could risk a military confrontation with Russia should she pursue the establishment of a no-fly zone over Syrian airspace, which she publically advocated during the presidential debates.

Trump is the most prominent American political figure to advocate détente with Russia, openly breaking with his neoconservative running mate Mike Pence. Trump has criticised Clinton for supporting anti-government insurgents in Syria and called for jointly targeting ISIS with the Russian, and by extension, Syrian militaries. Trump, being very critical of Iran, also signalled he was willing to fight against ISIS on the same side as Tehran. 

He has also offered support for the establishment of a safe zone inside Syrian territory, potentially in cooperation with the Syrian government and its allies. Both candidates would pursue a different policy approach from the incumbent administration in Syria, but Clinton’s no-fly zone holds greater potential to deepen military hostilities between major powers. Clinton has generally been critical of Obama’s foreign policy in Syria and elsewhere for not asserting US power strongly enough.

Despite the differences in style and demeanour, the range of policies offered by the entrenched two-party system is limited to varying shades the centre to far right. Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump are the least trusted and most unpopular presidential candidates in modern history. Despite the public disillusionment with major party candidates, it remains to be seen whether American voters will cast ballots for third parties such as the Libertarian Party or Green Party, which are seeking to garner 5 percent of the popular vote to become eligible to receive public campaign funding.

More likely than not, American voters will cast their ballots ‘against’ Trump by voting for Clinton and vice versa, fueling the cyclical politics of the lesser evil that have been a feature of American presidential politics for decades. More than any other US election in recent history, the candidates represent the rot of an American political establishment marred by scandal, hypocrisy and the relentless pursuit of hegemony. To advocate one over the other is ultimately defeatist. 

Nile Bowie is a political analyst based in Malaysia who has written for a number of publications, his expertise lies in a number of areas, with a particular focus on Asian politics and geopolitics, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.

The escalating charges aimed at Russia and Syria, reinforced by well-orchestrated media campaigns propagating official talking points, are familiar in the sense that such attempts to mould public opinion have traditionally been a precursor to Western military interventions.

Western and Gulf states have been unequivocal about their intention to topple the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, presumably to replace it with a client regime that would maintain an adversarial relationship with Russia, Iran and various political forces associated with Shia Islam.

On the ground, the Syrian military, supported by Russian, Iranian and Lebanese Hezbollah allies are on the path to military victory over the rebel-held east of Aleppo, which would mark the restoration of government control in all of Syria’s largest population centres.

Insurgents that have been armed and supported by the United States are now besieged in eastern Aleppo fighting Syrian government forces in coordination with jihadist militants, including the al-Nusra Front, the former Syrian wing of al Qaeda that Washington itself classifies as a terrorist organisation.

Some 270 thousand civilians are besieged alongside the militants controlling the area. Though the ongoing offensive has undoubtedly put the civilian population of the area at risk, larger questions about the fighting in Aleppo have hardly been raised by Western media.

The dominant narrative about Aleppo asserts claims that Syria and Russia are ‘deliberately bombing schools and hospitals to kill civilians’ or maintaining a siege to ‘break the will of the population’.

Almost no serious questions are asked of the rebel leadership in control of eastern Aleppo. The insurgents’ routine shelling of government-held western Aleppo – where the vast majority of the population, reportedly 1.5 million, reside – is hardly reported.

It must be recognised that the primary armed opposition fighting in eastern Aleppo and elsewhere are jihadist insurgents who have either superficially distanced themselves from the al-Qaeda brand or openly associate with it. More so, it is common knowledge that these groups have committed beheadings and heinous rights abuses.

Given the ferocity of Russian and Syrian airstrikes, why haven’t more civilians attempted to leave eastern Aleppo? UN Syria Envoy Staffan de Mistura claimed that Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, the rebranded version of al-Qaeda’s Syria affiliate, is holding ‘hostage’ the civilian population of east Aleppo.

From a humanitarian perspective, it is pertinent to question the effectiveness of the forceful approach taken by the Syrian and Russian militaries. There is a precedent for a non-violent solution to the situation, advocated by De Mistura himself.

In August 2016, a deal between government forces and militants ended the four-year siege of the Damascus suburb of Daraya. Civilians were evacuated and militants were bused to rebel-held areas in northern Syria without surrendering their weapons. This took place with the full cooperation of government forces.

De Mistura has offered to personally accompany the jihadist fighters out of eastern Aleppo, while other (allegedly ‘moderate’) insurgents and civilians remain under conditions of a ceasefire. The botched September 2016 ceasefire also sought this outcome, a key condition being that US-backed rebels divorce themselves from jihadist al-Nusra fighters.

It is clear that expelling these jihadist forces is the prerequisite for quelling the fighting in Aleppo, but there is political resistance to this outcome from Western and Gulf states because it would imply the surrender of anti-Assad groups and the impotence of their regime change objectives.

Moreover, as Syria’s largest city, Aleppo represents a major strategic prize. If captured, the foreign-backed opposition could establish an alternative Syrian government, which Western and Gulf states would then treat as the sole legitimate government.

The battle for Aleppo has been characterised as an ‘existential crisis’ for the mainstream anti-Assad forces. Should the Syrian government retake eastern Aleppo, it would deal a devastating blow to regime change efforts, but it would not mean a decisive end to the war. Kurdish forces have maintained their hold over parts of Syria, while the Islamic State continues to hold much territory.

That being said, the United States, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and others have invested enormous political capital to regime change efforts in Syria. Washington is determined to avoid a costly and humiliating defeat in Aleppo and is currently reviewing measures to shore up its proxies.

Among the options under consideration is the establishment of a no-fly-zone and safe zones, staging attacks against the Syrian air force and arming the Syrian rebels with additional weaponry. Should the US attempt of these options, it would directly violate international law.

The United States is not technically at war with the Syria, nor is there a UN resolution authorising American forces to operate inside Syria’s borders. Establishing a no-fly zone over Syrian airspace, safe zones within Syrian territory, or US military attacks on the Syrian air force and its bases would directly constitute an act of war against Damascus – and by extension, Moscow.

The Washington Post reports:

“‘There’s an increased mood in support of kinetic actions against the regime,’ one senior administration official said. ‘The CIA and the Joint Staff have said that the fall of Aleppo would undermine America’s counterterrorism goals in Syria.’’

“One proposed way to get around the White House’s long-standing objection to striking the Assad regime without a U.N. Security Council resolution would be to carry out the strikes covertly and without public acknowledgement, the official said.”

It is deeply alarming and baffling that the US leadership has here equated the fall of the jihadist-occupied Aleppo as harmful to counterterrorism objectives. Should moral outrage be directed at any side, it should not be toward the Syrian and Russian governments, who are attempting to restore legal order over Syrian territory, albeit by controversial means.

Rather, it is the United States and its European and Gulf allies that have forged an alliance with terrorist organisations in an attempt to destroy an independent-minded secular nationalist government promoting a pluralistic and inclusive form of Islam that should most beget public condemnation.

This would certainly be the case if the Western public at large ever truly absorbed the gravity of what their governments have done in Syria. It is unlikely that President Obama would concede to a major military escalation during his final months in office, though the possibility remains.

Hillary Clinton, who will presumably become the next US president, publically supports the establishment of a no-fly zone in Syria and has openly stated her number one objective in Syria is the removal of Bashar al-Assad’s government.

Russia has begun to deploy advanced anti-missile and anti-aircraft systems in Syria. Trust between Russia and the United States has entirely eroded. Russia is holding the cards in Syria and it is difficult to imagine how open conflict can be avoided should the US pursue an escalation. The seriousness of this moment should not be understated.

Nile Bowie is a political analyst based in Malaysia who has written for a number of publications, his expertise lies in a number of areas, with a particular focus on Asian politics and geopolitics, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.

Events in northern Syria have taken a dramatic turn in recent days, beginning with an unprecedented US airstrike on Syrian army positions in Deir ez-Zor. US officials have said they were aiming for ISIS targets but struck Syrian army positions accidently, killing 62 soldiers and exposing the remaining survivors to an Islamic State offensive.

In the days prior, the New York Times reported on a public disagreement between Secretary of State John Kerry and Defense Secretary Ashton Carter over the terms of the proposed ceasefire being negotiated with Russia.

Carter was said to have ‘deep reservations’ over plans for American and Russian forces to share information and jointly target terrorist organisations as made conditional in the ceasefire proposal. Defense Department officials publically refused to affirm whether they would implement the agreement.

The subsequent attacks on a UN relief convoy saw US officials strongly imply responsibility on Moscow. Reuters and others carried claims by anonymous US officials identifying Russia as the perpetrator, while mention of the recent US strike in Deir ez-Zor was omitted from most dispatches.

The Syrian and the Russian militaries have since publicly and categorically denied striking the convoy. UN officials initially described the attack as an ‘airstrike’, implicitly pinning the blame on Russian or Syrian aircraft, but have since conceded to lacking conclusive evidence about what had happened.

Top US military officials admitted they were unsure who attacked the convoy, though Defense Secretary Carter maintains that “Russians are responsible for this strike whether they conducted it or not.”  Through the words and actions of US officials, one can draw the conclusion that the US military establishment would not allow the Kerry-Lavrov ceasefire to succeed.

Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov hinted as much, telling Russian media that the “[US] military may not be obeying their supreme commander,” in reference to the increasingly apparent divisions within the Obama administration pertaining to policy on Syria.

In collapsing the ceasefire, the Pentagon is rejecting cooperation with Russia and refusing to enforce the separation of US-allied rebel groups from Jabhat al-Nusra and other terrorist organisations, likely on the basis that jihadists can act as the most effective bulwark against the Syrian army’s retaking of Aleppo.

The collapse of the ceasefire has coincided with a full-scale offensive to retake Aleppo by Syrian and Russian forces, supported by Iranian and Lebanese Hezbollah allies. “The fall of Aleppo would restore Assad’s rule over western Syria’s most important city and deal a devastating blow to the rebels,” reports Reuters.

The strategic and symbolic significance of the liberation of Aleppo is apparent, and now the immediate focus of the US and Gulf powers that support the armed groups is to hinder the advance of Syrian forces and their allies as they consolidate control over Castello road (the last remaining rebel supply route) and surround areas of eastern Aleppo held by insurgents.

The torrent of war-crime accusations and scathing denunciations of Moscow and Damascus in recent days is not authentically motivated by human rights, but rather is a means of using adverse global opinion to pressure Russia into easing the Syrian army’s offensive, which may otherwise soon defeat the remaining rebel forces in Aleppo.

Dismal human rights violations have undoubtedly occurred since the collapse of the ceasefire, perpetuated by both sides. That being said, it is crucial to acknowledge that when similar rights violations are committed by Israel in its suppression of Palestinians, by Saudi Arabia in its illegal war in Yemen, or by US-backed forces fighting in Syria, the moral indignation of the international community is dramatically subdued.

The difference is that Syria is enforcing its legal right to territorial sovereignty against insurgents armed by hostile states, a predicament that any state would meet with lethal force. The furious vilification of the Syrian and Russian militaries is entirely political, and a telling indication that Western and Gulf powers see themselves on the losing side of the conflict.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault has gone as far as threatening countries with complicity in war crimes should they not support an upcoming security council resolution imposing a ceasefire in Aleppo, which could only be an overtly politicised document filled with untenable concessions designed to be vetoed by Russia.

During his farewell address to the UN General Assembly, the supine and ever-obsequious Ban Ki-moon singled out the government of Syria as being the party most guilty of human rights violations. Is it not one of the great scandals of the Syrian conflict that the Secretary-General has placed the government of a UN member state on a lower moral tier than terrorist organisations like Jabhat al-Nusra and the Islamic State?

Ban’s statement reflects the deep ideological distortions of the Syrian narrative pushed by Western and Gulf powers to support toppling the government of Bashar al-Assad. One cannot talk seriously of human rights violators without apportioning blame for the bloodshed on the parties who have flooded Syria with armed mercenaries for their geopolitical pursuits, all of whom the Secretary-General has never meaningfully taken to task.

In the face of the Syrian army closing in around Aleppo, the US has indicated that it intends to halt diplomacy with Russia and escalate its use of force. Reuters reports:

 “The U.S. officials said the failure of diplomacy in Syria has left the Obama administration no choice but to consider alternatives, most of which involve some use of force… the list of options is narrowing to supporting rebel counter attacks elsewhere with additional weaponry or even air strikes, which ‘might not reverse the tide of battle, but might cause the Russians to stop and think.’”

“The most dramatic option under consideration – but considered less likely – would be a U.S. air strike on a Syrian air base far from the fighting between Assad’s troops and rebel forces in the north, officials said.”

Though the Obama administration has exercised a decreasing measure of restraint when directly engaging Syrian government targets, there are growing indications that the administration believes the objectives of Western and Gulf policy cannot be met without exerting greater force. Should the US president not show an appetite for escalation in his final months in office, his successor will.

Nile Bowie is a political analyst based in Malaysia who has written for a number of publications, his expertise lies in a number of areas, with a particular focus on Asian politics and geopolitics, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.

Inter-Korean relations have reached their nadir. Following the North’s fourth nuclear test in January and subsequent long-range rocket launch that placed a satellite in orbit, Seoul has closed

This means that all inter-Korean cooperation and exchange, as well as the channels for emergency communication between North and South Korea have been suspended. Meanwhile, the Security Council has passed Resolution 2270, noted for the introduction of severe sectoral sanctions against Pyongyang.

US and South Korean soldiers are currently taking part in annual large-scale military exercises, which reportedly feature training and simulations of preemptive strikes on Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile sites, amphibious landings on North Korean shores, and a”beheading operation” aimed at assassinating Kim Jong-un and toppling his government in the event of war.

Rather than achieving the goal of pressuring North Korea to the negotiating table to dismantle its nuclear program (which the spokespersons of the international community claim is their objective), the latest developments continue to push Pyongyang into a corner and serve to further diminish opportunities to stabilise the situation.

While it is true that the regular exchange of severe threats and bellicose rhetoric between the warring Korean states has not translated into an armed exchange since 2010, the shifting nuances of the regional security landscape and the current strain on Sino-DPRK relations have the potential to make the situation less predictable.

The Changing Sino-DPRK Relationship

Beijing has long attempted to dissuade North Korea from pursuing nuclear weapons, encouraging it to instead focus on pursuing wider economic reforms. China has put remarkable pressure on North Korea to no avail, and its deep frustration with Pyongyang is evident by the absence of high-level diplomacy between the two countries.

Chinese President Xi Jinping and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un have not met face-to-face. Beijing has opted for maintaining a minimum degree of stability in its relations with Pyongyang, and has instead placed great priority on improving ties with South Korea, despite the pro-US strategic orientation of the Park Geun-hye government in Seoul.

China is South Korea’s largest trading partner, with economic activity between the two exceeding the latter’s combined trade with Japan and the US. Despite this deep economic cooperation between Beijing and Seoul, the potential deployment of an American missile defense system ­in South Korea has threatened to undermine strategic bilateral ties.

Lockheed Martin’s Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense – or THAAD – has long been considered for use in South Korea as a counter to North Korea’s nuclear deterrent. Washington has expedited its intention to deploy the THAAD system following Pyongyang’s latest nuclear test and satellite launch,  a move met with staunch opposition in Beijing.

The issue has proven so contentious that Qiu Guohong, China’s ambassador to South Korea, warned that the two countries’ relationship could be “destroyed in an instant” if Seoul allowed the American missile defense system to be deployed on its soil, arguing that the THAAD system would impede China’s security interests.

Beijing views THAAD as a means of reducing the effectiveness of its own strategic nuclear deterrent, giving the US the ability to track, monitor, and terminate Chinese missiles from South Korean soil, thus securing its own security interests against the backdrop of the Sino-US rivalry in the South China Sea and the Asia-Pacific region more generally.

North Korea serves as an ideal pretext to bolster further American military presence in the region, which is precisely why China is opposed to Pyongyang’s brinkmanship. Under the guise of the North Korean threat, Washington is solidifying its network of alliances and increasing its strategic military capabilities throughout the region.

The annual military exercises conducted by the US-South Korea, which boast the participation of over three-hundred thousand soldiers, are a source of concern in Beijing as much as in Pyongyang. These exercises are carried out in the neighborhood of China’s busiest Yellow Sea ports – at Tangshan, Tianjin, Qingdao and Dalian – and feature drills and maneuvers that can be used against the Chinese military.

Sino-US Cooperation on DPRK Sanctions

The international response to the DPRK’s latest nuclear test and satellite launch has been notable for the closer cooperation between the United States and China. Beijing’s approach to dealing with North Korea has been fundamentally different from that of the United States or South Korea: it has always opposed sanctions that would push Pyongyang toward domestic instability or a humanitarian crisis.

This time around, Beijing has conceded to measures it previously opposed, such as new sectoral sanctions that limit imports on North Korean coal and iron ore when it can be demonstrated that earnings are channeled toward nuclear and missile development. In addition, Pyongyang is barred from exporting gold, titanium and rare earth minerals, all of which constitute over half the country’s exports.

Moreover, the sanctions call for a ban on the sale of aviation fuel and harsh restrictions on North Korean financial operations and shipping, including obligatory inspections of the country’s vessels at foreign ports. US unilateral sanctions will target banks and companies in third countries that engage in transactions with North Korea, which will further isolate the country from the global financial system.

China has sternly opposed US proposals to sanction energy supplies tied to the welfare of ordinary North Korean civilians, while Russia has called for legitimate relationships between North Korea and foreign partners in the private-sector economy to be exempt for sanctions. More than 90% of North Korea’s foreign trade is with China, and thus the implementation and impact of key measures regarding trade and shipping will depend largely on China.

Beijing is keenly aware that biting sanctions which have the effect of destabilising Pyongyang will serve to push Sino-DPRK relations into unstable territory. It should be noted that China has agreed to introducing tougher measures on North Korea primarily as a measure intended to dissuade the US from deploying THAAD at Beijing’s doorstep.

DPRK and the Nuclear Question

China has rightly called on the United States to negotiate a peace treaty with North Korea as part of any agreement for the latter to denuclearise, ending the technical state of war that has endured following the 1953 armistice agreement between the two Koreas.

Washington has maintained that it will only engage in negotiations with the DPRK on a peace treaty if denuclearisation is an objective of the talks. This position is a complete non-starter for Pyongyang. An insistence on pre-conditions that effectively demands the DPRK’s surrender in exchange for negotiations should not be seen as a serious proposal.

It is rather a tactical maneuver to force Pyongyang onto a permanent war-footing to justify an increasing US military presence in Asia-Pacific. Regardless of our opinions about North Korea’s political and social system, Pyongyang’s argument for a nuclear deterrent ­is no less valid than those of other designated nuclear weapon states.

It should be acknowledged that the United States has historically refused to rule out a first-use deployment of nuclear arms in a conflict with North Korea. The New York Times reported that a modernised precision-guided warhead currently in the late stages of development was “designed with problems like North Korea in mind.”

Pyongyang faces a considerable threat to its national security from the United States, which is currently pursuing an atomic revitalization program estimated to cost up to $1 trillion over three decades. The large-scale troop movements and overflights of B-52 bombers during the annual US-South Korea military exercises only reinforce the North’s desire to possess a strategic nuclear deterrent. 

For North Koreans, the nuclear question is one of ensuring a basic political existence – they believe their nuclear program has staved off an Iraq-style invasion and prevents limited strikes on their military assets. The window has closed on North Korea dismantling its program, especially against the backdrop of foes and even allies who are increasingly hostile to it.

While the latest sanctions will further impede the modest growth North Korea has achieved in the last five years and pose an obstacle to the country’s wider development objectives if stringently implemented, Pyongyang is more likely to accept heavier sanctions as the cost maintaining a nuclear deterrent, the ultimate guarantor of national security.

It will eventually become clear that Pyongyang will not yield to being sanctioned or threatened into dismantling its nuclear program. At some point, the United States will have to concede to what it cannot change: that North Korea is a nuclear state irrespective of whether it has achieved a certain means of delivery.

How the United States and South Korea approach this turning point remains to be seen. Washington can choose to acknowledge Pyongyang’s nuclear status, establishing official liaison offices and a direct communication mechanism in each other’s capitals as a means of defusing potential nuclear brinkmanship when tension occurs. This outcome can be negotiated in the context of a peace treaty.

Based the views gaining currency in the ruling Saenuri Party and the hard-line approach of the Park administration, which has advocated an absorption scenario based on the German unification model, the South Korean establishment would sooner opt for withdrawing from the NPT in pursuit of its own nuclear program before any move to recognize the DPRK as a nuclear weapons state.

In such a scenario, the United States may opt to redeploy American nuclear warheads to South Korea to deter Seoul from launching a nuclear program, raising tensions with Beijing and Pyongyang, pushing the two allies into the same corner and potentially encouraging China to drop its opposition to the North’s nuclear program. A wider arms race in the Asia-Pacific becomes entirely conceivable.

What is certain is that constructive and stabilising measures cannot be realised with inter-Korean communication suspended. A sanctions regime that will exacerbate hardship and potentially destabilise the domestic situation in North Korea makes the region less stable and more prone to conflict. A new approach is sorely needed.

Nile Bowie is a political analyst based in Malaysia who has written for a number of publications, his expertise lies in a number of areas, with a particular focus on Asian politics and geopolitics, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.

Myanmar is a country rapidly moving toward uncharted political terrain. By March 2016, the National League for Democracy (NLD) will take power for the first time in history, bringing an end to five decades of rule by the military establishment. 

The ascent of the NLD comes at a time when Myanmar finds itself at a new strategic crossroads, pulled toward the geopolitical orbit of major powers: the United States and China, as well as India. Since the outgoing military-backed government opened the country to Western investment in 2011, the US has prioritised its relationship with Myanmar as part of its strategy to reassert influence in the Asia-Pacific region. The country has received numerous visits by US high-ranking leaders, including President Obama on two occasions.

China, the country’s neighbour and largest trading partner, has long suspected Washington of seeking to influence Myanmar’s opening to nurture a regime with an antagonistic position toward Beijing. While the NLD positions itself to form a new government, the rise of this political force with a thoroughly pro-Western orientation, which has long anchored itself as a pro-democracy movement lauded throughout the West, begs the question of Myanmar’s place in the current geopolitical scenario.

The Constitutional Question

As the military-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) prepares to handover power to the NLD, it appears that the political dynamics of the ongoing transition are based around pragmatism between the military establishment and the pro-democracy camp, both of whom harbour old enmities. The military issued a conciliatory response and expressed interest in working together with the NLD, signalling a desire to peacefully transfer power.

Under the current constitution, drafted by the military in 2008, Aung San Suu Kyi is ineligible to become president due to her children holding foreign (British) citizenship. Despite widespread NLD opposition to the constitution, Suu Kyi will be effectively appointing the next president to avoid any clashes with the military, signalling that the party is not looking to rustle feathers by pushing for constitutional change in the near-term.

The military is the most powerful institution in the country, both de facto and constitutionally. Under the terms of the military-drafted constitution, 25 percent of the parliament is allotted to unelected military representatives, while a powerful part of the bureaucracy will remain under the direct control of the military, including control over the police, military, and domestic security apparatus, and the power to issue passports.

After the NLD’s sweeping victory, Suu Kyi took aim at the military-drafted constitution by saying she would serve above the president, who she described as being subservient to her as party president. Despite this rhetoric, there are many indications that the NLD understands that the key to a functioning government involves cooperation with the military. It would simply be impossible to administer the country without having the support of the home ministry and Myanmar’s generals, and the NLD is not prepared to mount a direct challenge to the military.

The extent of this cooperation remains to be seen. Despite the NLD formally taking over the executive, it should be understood that the military’s acquiescence to peacefully transfer power implies that the new political arrangement is a de facto power-sharing arrangement between Suu Kyi and the military. Despite a contentious past that saw the violent suppression of the NLD and its leader condemned to two decades of house arrest, Suu Kyi is now in some dimension aligned with her former captors. 

The Question of Development

The degree to which the NLD and the military have today found common ground on a wide range of positions has spurred disappointment from Western rights advocates who view her pragmatic political conservatism as a retreat from defending human rights. Most notably, Suu Kyi has kept silent on the official discrimination of Rohingya Muslims across displacement camps in western Myanmar, as well as the current government’s attacks against ethnic minorities in various parts of the country.

On developmental matters, the NLD have failed to articulate a detailed strategy and there is reason to believe that Suu Kyi’s stewardship over the economy will be an extension of the status quo, characterised by an upending of human rights concerns by the enormous bargaining power of global investment capital. Myanmar’s rapidly liberalising economy – brought about by reforms that have driven displacement, human rights abuses, and social unrest – have given a boost to a growing urban middle class at the expense of an exploited underclass.  

In recent years, Suu Kyi has collaborated closely with the USDP government by courting foreign investment and encouraging closer diplomatic ties with the US and its allies. Myanmar owes its investment boom in no small part to the personality of Suu Kyi, who leveraged her close ties with the West to end US sanctions and open the floodgates of foreign capital, bringing with it poverty wages, gruelling hours, and unsafe working conditions for a large segment of the domestic labour market.

The NLD and the USDP see eye-to-eye on pro-market restructuring to encourage multinational investment and an export-oriented industrialisation strategy, which has thus far not been offset by increased expenditure on basic services. Suu Kyi’s embrace of neoliberalism and reluctance to advocate for human rights since entering politics signals that the NLD will put the bottom line of foreign investors before the rights and general welfare of labourers and ethnic minorities.

The Question of Federalism

The NLD has long garnered support across ethnic lines, from rural villages and urbanites alike, though its leadership represents sections of the majority ethnic Burman elite whose interests were undermined for decades by the military’s monopoly over important sectors of the economy. Despite capturing a larger-than-expected segment of the ethnic minority vote, Suu Kyi carefully avoided rhetoric during her campaign that would upset ethno-nationalist and Burman chauvinist sentiment.

Myanmar is one of the most ethnically diverse countries on the planet, with over 100 ethnic minorities and sub-groups, each with separate languages, culture and customs. Armed conflicts between rebel groups have continued unabated in the nearly seven decades since Myanmar’s independence, and the question of federalism is one of the largest political challenges the incoming government must face. Attempts to broker a nationwide ceasefire have been unsuccessful in recent years, despite active engagement between the USDP government and ethnic leaders in multiple rounds of negotiations.

In recent times ethnic parties have begun to call more forcefully for a federal structure comprised of politically autonomous ethnic states, as well as greater self-government in regards to administration, culture, education, and the management of natural resources. The NLD has voiced a public commitment to bringing about a federal system but has offered few specifics, though it is still widely seen by ethnic minorities as being more amenable to making concessions in contrast to the military.

President Thein Sein has expressed support for a federal system in theory, but top military leaders oppose a central demand of many of ethnic leaders: the integration of ethnic militias into a federal army. The USDP government has also failed to integrate some of the most powerful and influential armed groups into ceasefire negotiations, such as the ethnic Chinese separatist guerrillas that operate in the remote Kokang region on the border with China’s Yunnan province, as well as the Kachin Independence Army and Shan State Army.

Kokang guerrillas clashed with the military for four months during 2015 in one of the most intense standoffs in decades prior to declaring a unilateral ceasefire after coming under pressure from Beijing. The military incurred hundreds of causalities and failed to make much headway against the Kokang forces, despite sending tens of thousands of troops into the mountainous region supported by aircraft and artillery.

During an offensive last March against the Kokang rebels, Myanmar mistakenly dropped a bomb on the Chinese side of the border, killing five Chinese farmers working in a sugar-cane field. Beijing responded angrily and called on the USDP government to open peace negotiations with the Kokang, which government officials refused. The issue of federalism and a national ceasefire between the government and all armed groups is central not only to promoting development and national coherence, but also to China’s strategic interests in Myanmar and its own landlocked southwestern Yunnan region.

As the daughter of Myanmar’s independence hero, Aung San (who promoted a federalist system before his assassination in 1947), Suu Kyi and the NLD are uniquely positioned to lead the peace process. Her failure to break the impasse and achieve an outcome on federalism that is agreeable to powerful ethnic minorities could deepen racial friction and instil the perception that she has become co-opted by her alliance with the military.

The Question of China

Myanmar’s landmark election was watched closely from Beijing, which publicly welcomed the results but nonetheless holds concerns about the orientation of the incoming NLD government. As Myanmar’s largest trading partner and neighbour, China wields irreplaceable influence over the country’s geopolitical and economic development. Since the 2011 policy shift, however, Naypyidaw has drawn closer to Washington, effectively downgrading its relationship with Beijing.

China was the main backer of Myanmar’s military junta and largest investor during years of international seclusion, spending billions on infrastructure such as pipelines, ports, and dams. Despite major investments, anti-Chinese sentiment is rife throughout Myanmar due to the controversial implementation of large-scale projects, which saw populations forcibly relocated by the army and major land confiscations. Since the relaxation on censorship laws, public criticism of China is now commonplace in local-language media.

Though there is no overt signs of hostility between Beijing and Naypyidaw, a gradual deterioration of relations has taken place in recent years, evidenced by China’s foreign direct investment having dropped from $8.2 billion in the peak year of 2010/11 to merely $56 million in 2013/14. China-backed projects such as the Myitsone dam and the Letpadaung copper mine have been the subject of protests, spurred on by US-funded NGOs and media outlets.

Beijing has taken a pragmatic approach to the rise of Aung San Suu Kyi and the NLD, and appears willing to accommodate with her. There is, however, deep skepticism toward Suu Kyi and concerns that she could pursue policies that undermine China’s interests. In a rare occasion of state-level interaction with an opposition leader, China invited Suu Kyi to Beijing last June, where she met with President Xi Jinping.

Beijing was clearly anticipating an NLD victory and moved proactively to open dialogue with Suu Kyi to promote the development of relations. To offset any antagonism between China and the NLD, its likely that Beijing will offer its financial muscle in various aid projects and assistance as a mediator in the domestic peace process when the new government takes over.

China would seek the re-opening of the now-suspended suspended Myitsone dam project, as well as resolutions to numerous economic initiatives, such as the Kyaukphyu special economic zone, plans to construct a Sino-Myanmar highway, and various joint transportation initiatives. Despite attempts by civil society in Myanmar to disseminate hostility against China, the NLD appears cognisant that a constructive relationship with Beijing is essential to ensuring investment for major capital-intensive development projects.

India has taken notice of China’s presence on the Indian Ocean, where Chinese state-owned firms manage Myanmar’s Kyaukphyu port and Pakistan’s Gwadar port. Delhi’s response has been to develop a port in Sittwe, on Myanmar’s western coast, which is currently in the final stages of construction. Myanmar’s political establishment are favourably disposed toward India and have maintained excellent bilateral relations, though Delhi is widely seen as being unable to match the level of financing that Beijing has shown a willingness to put forward.

Suu Kyi’s visit to China underscores how there will not be a wholesale rejection of Chinese investment and assistance, despite Beijing’s mishandling of past projects with Myanmar’s military and the neglect of Myanmar’s pro-democracy camp. China has an important stake in Myanmar’s stability because military conflicts inside the country are impediments to it’s own economic and strategic programs. Furthermore, Beijing is by far the most qualified candidate to monitor Myanmar’s peace process given its geographic position and familiarity with the region’s internal dynamics.

It is in China’s interests to revaluate its economic cooperation with Myanmar to ensure the welfare and interests of local people through grass-roots communication with communities in areas marked for development. Beijing should better regulate the performance of Chinese enterprises that have garnered contentious reputations in Myanmar while doing more to ensure Chinese investors comply with the rule of law.

The Question of Washington’s Pivot to Asia

Since 2011, the large-scale refocusing of American corporate and military muscle to the Asia-Pacific region has been a key foreign policy objective in Washington. Naypyidaw’s opening to the United States is one component of an over-arching policy to harness the power of developing nations throughout the ASEAN region to serve as an economic counterweight to Beijing.

The United States is attempting to realise this goal through instruments like the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement – a sweeping trade deal that includes a number of Pacific Rim nations but excludes China – which aims to formulate new rules for international trade around core US strategic interests. Though Myanmar is not part of the TPP, it was once firmly in Beijing’s orbit but has now realigned itself to Washington.

Naypyidaw’s policy shift and the subsequent triumph of Aung San Suu Kyi will surely be utilised as a vehicle for US interests in the region, under the guise of promoting the universality of Western democracy. Though the NLD has indicated its penchant for pragmatism with its approach to Beijing, it remains to be seen to what extent Suu Kyi would acquiesce to attempts by the West to drive a wedge between China and Myanmar.

Moreover, she may deicide demonstrate support for pro-democracy movements in China or Nobel laureates like the Dalai Lama or activist Liu Xiaobo of her own accord. In the past, Suu Kyi has selectively criticised the practices of Chinese state-enterprises while applauding the conduct of Western energy firms like Total, despite its controversial history of collaborating with the military junta.

Though she may be predisposed to give preferential treatment to Western investment, she notably endorsed the China-backed Letpadaung copper mine project as leader of an investigative committee tasked with evaluating the project. Despite considerable opposition from local residents and Myanmar society in general, she displayed pragmatism in handling a major Chinese project in this instance even at the cost of alienating her own supporters.

Despite being ideologically aligned with the West, the NLD appears to understand that balanced relations with China and other Asian countries are the surest means of securing investment for large-scale infrastructure, while American companies are only just testing the waters and expanding their business relationships in Myanmar in areas such as tourism, energy, and telecommunications.

Military ties between Washington and Naypyidaw have been modest at this stage, with the inclusion of observers from Myanmar’s military during the annual Cobra Gold regional military exercises led by the US and Thailand. There remains a high degree of distrust between members of the US Congress and Myanmar’s generals, but these misgivings could quickly give way if the military maintains a conciliatory approach to the NLD. Increased US military presence in Myanmar will be unfavourably perceived in Beijing.

As the NLD prepares to lead the next government, there are enormous expectations for Suu Kyi to clean up corruption and improve the effectiveness of long-neglected and underfunded government services. Myanmar is now emerging from six decades of isolation, and political stability is crucial to allowing the country to rebuild its economic and social institutions to reverse the severe underinvestment in education and infrastructure it suffers from.

Unfortunately, the NLD has yet to articulate policy specifics and a strategy for the future of the country. Much of the incoming government’s focus is on manoeuvring through a political landscape still shaped by the military. Myanmar’s generals made a bargain on the West and have gotten what they came for: a huge influx of foreign capital and a secure inroad to the global economy. If Suu Kyi can promise the generals that they need not fear reprisals under an NLD government, perhaps only then would the military consent to constitutional reform, allowing her to hold the presidency.

Nile Bowie is a political analyst based in Malaysia who has written for a number of publications, his expertise lies in a number of areas, with a particular focus on Asian politics and geopolitics, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.

In the run-up to Singapore’s recent general elections, the victory of the People’s Action Party (PAP) – which has presided over transformational social and economic development throughout its continuous five-decade rule – was a forgone conclusion. The question on people’s minds was rather, to what extent could opposition parties dent the ruling party’s dominance and gain a foothold in Parliament?

Tens of thousands attended rallies organized by opposition parties during the campaign period, leading many to believe that opposition candidates would steadily gain more ground after the ruling PAP suffered its worst electoral performance in history during the last election cycle in 2011. Contrary to predictions of a watershed election, the PAP secured huge margins, claiming nearly 70 percent of the popular vote in a spectacular rebound.

2015’s elections were presented as an “unprecedented” challenge to Singapore’s ruling party in the international media. On the ground, the sense of a growing momentum for left-leaning opposition parties like the Worker’s Party (WP) and the Singapore Democratic Party (SDP) and other largely untested parties could be felt. Even government-friendly state media devoted front page coverage to well-attended opposition rallies.  

Despite projections and popular sentiments that suggested a real possibility for opposition parties to capture a larger share of the vote, opposition parties instead saw their share of the vote plummet in 2015 by as much as 16 percent from 2011, with no headway made. How then, in the current political landscape, should the PAP’s stunning resurgence be accounted for?

Singapore’s Leftward Shift

Perennial ”bread and butter” issues remain at the heart of electoral politics in Singapore, one of the world’s most expensive countries. As a small city-state with a limited domestic market and no natural resources, Singapore has shaped itself into a global financial center and a major hub for maritime services, oil trading, and electronics manufacturing by harnessing a growth model built around liberal immigration and foreign direct investment policies.

Singapore citizens currently make up 61 percent of the country’s 5.47 million people, and the influx of recent migrants has given rise to overcrowding, rising living and property costs, and a widening income disparity. Singapore’s government is relying on immigration to offset declining birth rates, with an expected increase in population to 6.5 million or even 6.9 million by 2030, of which 45 percent will be foreigners.

The rising tide of immigration remains a contentious issue in Singapore, as migrants are blamed for fuelling inflation, depressing wages, and taking jobs: not only low-paying positions but also middle and high-paying professions. The PAP’s poor performance in the 2011 polls can be attributed to opposition parties’ tapping into public disillusionment over foreign labor competition while positioning themselves as a check on the ruling party’s elitist brand of governance.

There are several factors that account for the PAP’s stunning comeback in 2015. Over the last four years, the government of Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong – the son of Singapore’s founder, Lee Kuan Yew – has acknowledged public grievances and apologized for some of his government’s previous policies. Seeking to make amends, he has embraced social-welfare spending and taxes for a larger swathe of high income-earners, steering away from the PAP’s unsparing meritocracy and low-tax policies of the previous five decades.

Lee’s government responded to public discontent by announcing tax increases on the top 5 percent of earners to fund subsidized health care programs for all Singaporeans and other welfare programs built to strengthen the safety net for elderly and low-paid workers. To address rising living costs, the PAP has taken steps to cool the property market and offset rising housing prices with more subsidies on affordable government housing.

On immigration, his government has curbed the influx of skilled foreign talent that have been perceived to be taking jobs from Singaporeans. The annual growth of foreign professionals, managers and executives fell from 45,000 a year to 13,000 in 2014. The PAP has worked to engage the public by addressing the hot-button issues and showing that it is capable of reinventing its policies to suit an era where populist discontent with neoliberalism is no longer politically tenable, and the results have reflected the success of the PAP’s leftward shift.

Towards An Inclusive PAP?

Two major events also contributed to the PAP’s victory: Singapore’s fiftieth anniversary celebrations and the death of the country’s founding father, Lee Kuan Yew, both of which had a strong psychological influence on voters and allowed the PAP to cement its relationship with the electorate in a significant way. Lee led Singapore for over 30 years as the country’s founding prime minister. As the nation’s unrivaled anchor personality, he embodied a sense of pride in Singapore’s accomplishments. Tens and thousands queued to pay their respects to Lee during a national mourning period following his passing in March in a demonstration of mass reverence.

His son, Lee Hsien Loong, built his electoral strategy by calling polls a year before they were legally required, thus benefitting from the mood of patriotism engendered by these two momentous events. Global developments also played a role in swaying public opinion in the PAP’s favor: market turbulence in China, the question of US interest rates, and the ongoing political scandal in neighboring Malaysia all culminated during the campaign period, leading many risk-averse and undecided voters who comprise Singapore’s silent majority to back the tried-and-tested PAP government.

Lee Hsien Loong has spoken of stepping down in 2020, and the latest round of polls also represents the passing of power from Singapore’s third to fourth generation leaders who will take the reigns after the next election; the newly unveiled cabinet is among the youngest in history and the PAP’s intent to mentor and groom these figures to lead is transparent. The tone and approach of the PAP in these latest elections provide strong indications of the party’s changing character and attitude toward itself.

If there were a single figure that represents a reformed PAP, it would be Deputy PM Tharman Shanmugaratnam, whom many – especially in the opposition – hope to see as a successor to Lee Hsien Loong. In contrast to the PAP’s historic aversion to welfarism and adherence to growth-at-all-costs policies, Tharman has advocated the need to strike a balance between redistributive social spending and economic policies; he has respectively distanced himself from the culture of hard-nosed self-reliance promoted by Singapore’s founding generation and has engineered many of the reforms rolled out since 2011.

Tharman and his team delivered the most outstanding performance in the polls – securing 79 percent of the vote in the Jurong constituency – slightly higher than the percentage received by the prime minister in his Ang Mo Kio constituency. Stressing the need to continually adapt in the interest of becoming more inclusive, Tharman has shunned the heavy-handed approach to government and declared a shifting away from the top-down approach that is synonymous with the PAP. He has signaled a shift away from traditional meritocracy in favor of building social mobility by investments in early-childhood education.

Regardless of whether Tharman Shanmugaratnam becomes the next leader of Singapore, his approach to governance and policy has set the tone for what people want to see from the PAP. It is, however, a shame that many credible and capable opposition candidates and their ideas – such as introducing a minimum wage, trimming the defense budget to fund social policies, and more radical measures to mitigate income inequality – will not have a presence in Parliament. Singapore’s opposition parties cannot ignore the fact that many do not see them as a reliable alternative, largely because of the immense influence on the media exercised by the incumbent.

As with previous elections in Singapore, these polls were a referendum on the PAP rather than a chance to elect an alternative government. The PAP is synonymous with the state, and former’s tremendous performance legitimacy ensures that opposition parties will face an uphill challenge for a long time to come. The outcome of 2015’s elections reflect the fact that a majority of Singaporeans are still willing to forego a stronger system of checks and balances afforded by a more representative Parliament in favor of the continued dominance of a PAP that is listening to the public adaptively reforming itself. 

Nile Bowie is a political analyst based in Malaysia who has written for a number of publications, his expertise lies in a number of areas, with a particular focus on Asian politics and geopolitics, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.

Malaysia’s prime minister, Najib Razak – a British-educated technocrat with a reputation for opulence – is at the center of an unprecedented scandal. A sovereign wealth fund established to develop lucrative industries and boost economic growth in Malaysia, the 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB), has incurred more than $11 billion in debts and is at the center of a political and financial controversy.

In July, an exposé in the Wall Street Journal published documents sourced from an ongoing government probe into 1MDB that traced nearly $700 million being channeled into Najib’s personal bank accounts from entities linked to the indebted fund. The fund paid inflated prices for assets and laundered money that Najib used to fund his campaign in the 2013 general elections, according to the source.

The allegations against the prime minister caused an uproar in Malaysia on both sides of the political divide. Najib denied wrong-doing and dismissed the report as political sabotage. In the days that followed, special task forces raided the offices of 1MDB and three linked companies, freezing bank accounts and seizing documents that could have paved the way for possible criminal charges against Najib and others.

Mahathir Mohamad, the highly influential former premier who led Malaysia for over two decades, led calls for Najib’s resignation in a series of stinging blog posts and interviews. Najib’s own deputy prime minister, Muhyiddin Yassin, joined those calling for a sincere explanation of the 1MDB debacle, warning that the issue had badly damaged the ruling party’s fledgling credibility.

Before the month’s end, Najib reshuffled his Cabinet, firing Muhyiddin and promoting right-wing firebrand Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, who also holds the portfolio of home minister, responsible for overseeing law enforcement. Abdul Gani Patail, the Attorney-General involved in the ongoing special task force probing 1MDB, was also replaced.

The head of Malaysia’s anti-corruption agency was sent on leave, while investigators from the central bank were intimidated with accusations of leaking government secrets. Four members of Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee were promoted into the executive branch of government.

Having dismantled the original task force charged with investigating 1MDB, Malaysia’s anticorruption body has recently cleared Najib, maintaining that the money did not come from a government-owned development fund, but from a legal political donationprovided by an Arab royal family to help ensure the election victory of the ruling party, the United Malays National Organization (UMNO).

Although public confidence in Najib’s leadership has plummeted, the prime minister has managed to maintain the allegiance of important figures in the UMNO hierarchy. Dissatisfaction is increasing among the party ranks, as evidenced by a recently lodgedlawsuit by UMNO members calling on Najib to account for the chronology of events involving the $700 million transfers into his account and to ultimately surrender the funds.

Najib’s Tenure In Context

Since coming to power in 2009, Najib has positioned himself as a business-friendly reformer, preaching inclusivity and moderate Islam as he courted Western investment, distancing himself from his predecessor Mahathir’s adversarial relationship with Washington and activist foreign policy. Najib elevated political and economic ties with the United States and has supported the controversial US-led Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement, while carefully balancing and expanding trade relations with China.

On the domestic front, Najib has struggled to sustain popularity throughout his tenure, despite abolishing provisions for detention without trial and enabling limited reforms that created more space for dissent and freedom of assembly. During the 2013 general elections, the ruling coalition secured its slimmest victory ever, losing the popular vote to the opposition coalition for the first time in more than four decades.

Despite his administration’s message of moderation, inclusivity and harmony among the nation’s many races, Najib has been reluctant to chastise figures that espouse bigotry and inflammatory language. He has been widely accused of allowing right-wing fringe groups to influence the state-sanctioned interpretation of Islam in an attempt to consolidate support among rural Muslim voters that have traditionally backed the ruling party, UMNO.

Najib’s tenure has been more generally beset by accusations of scandal and negative perceptions of his wife, Rosmah Mansor, whose lavish extravagance and luxury purchases of designer handbags and jewelry have fuelled the ire of Malaysians struggling with rising costs following broad energy subsidy cuts and a highly resented consumption tax on goods and services.

Malaysia’s economy has generally performed well during Najib’s tenure, but the ongoing political crisis has clouded the country’s growth outlook. Foreign investors are limiting their exposure to Malaysian capital markets and have sold-off more than $3 billion in shares, while the ringgit has hit a 17-year low and has become the worst performing currency in Asia. Malaysia’s Central Bank has begun digging into its foreign exchange reserves to shore up the undervalued ringgit against a prolonged period capital flight.

Given Malaysia’s relatively strong economic fundamentals – in spite of ample government debt and smaller trade and capital account surpluses –  the accelerated surge in capital outflows is mainly attributable to the political storm brewing over the unresolved 1MDB question. An increasingly turbulent outlook can be expected in the near-term if calls for Najib’s resignation intensify into sustained street protests, as expected by many.

Can Najib Survive?

Mahathir and Muhyiddin, both influential political heavyweights, have expressed the belief that UMNO would not be able to secure a victory at the ballot box if snap polls were held. Najib has lost the confidence of powerful figures among the ruling party and has emerged unshaken from the constant barrage of attacks from his predecessor. That he has still managed to maintain cohesion among UMNO in such conditions is a testament to the web of influence the prime minister has built through his lenience, favors, lucrative appointments and personal largesse.

While Mahathir wields notable sway over hearts and minds in UMNO, it has been more than a decade since he formally left politics and his influence is receding among the party’s top brass. Najib has not been openly challenged and derives his resilience from reshaping the party to serve his personal interests using patronage, money-politics and an emphasis on loyalty rather than competence. He has created multiple stakeholders whose careers depend on maintaining the status quo.

Though there is a lack of internal debate throughout much of UMNO, reports indicate that criticism of Najib is widely exchanged privately among party members. UMNO’s internal party elections – the main platform through which a challenger can vie to unseat the prime minister – have been deferred until after the next general election slated for 2018.

Though party elections have been postponed on previous occasions under past premiers, the decision to do so within the current political climate seems crafted to allow the current office bearers to buy time. For UMNO, a party that is grappling to rejuvenate itself and reverse its declining political relevance, deferring party elections to favor the old guard means that fewer fresh faces can emerge as appealing candidates. This would be a strategic blunder for a party desperate to return to power.

The other means through which Najib can be ousted is through a parliamentary vote of no-confidence, but several obstacles still remain. At least half of Malaysia’s 222-member lower house of Parliament would need to sign a statutory declaration to support a no-confidence vote. This appears unlikely at this stage, as Najib still has the support of UMNO’s various divisions.

According to Zahid Hamidi, the newly appointed Deputy PM, an UMNO leader – widely believed to Razaleigh Hamzah, a former finance minister – recently attempted to field support for a no-confidence vote that could have brought together a unity government with MPs from both sides of the political divide. Though such a procedure is constitutionally legal, Zahid claimed that UMNO would never let such as outcome occur.

At this juncture, there is every indication that Najib has no intention of resigning. He will use all the tools in his arsenal to secure his position. Being seen as a liability may not be enough to mobilize the UMNO rank and file, an alternative faction would have to emerge to lead the charge. Ousted Deputy PM Muhyiddin remains UMNO deputy president and wields a high degree of public support, but has thus far voiced his reluctance to challenge the leadership.

Malaysians from both sides of the divide strongly feel that the actions of Malaysia’s prime minister have diminished his credibility beyond repair, that the government’s response to the scandal proves an element of truth to the allegations, and that evidence is being withheld from the public. The calls for Najib’s resignation are only going to get louder and Malaysia will be less stable as a result.

Nile Bowie is a political analyst based in Malaysia who has written for a number of publications, his expertise lies in a number of areas, with a particular focus on Asian politics and geopolitics, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.