This morning is not a happy one for me here in Spain. I had not anticipated that Spain’s new president, Jos? Luis Rodr?guez Zapatero, would take the decision about the troops that he did yesterday, and I regret his having taken it.

In fact I was furious with him, since I feel the approriate place to have announced this decision would have been in the Spanish Parliament last Thursday and Friday – during the debate on his ‘canditature’ – where there would have been the possibility of a full and free debate on the decision itself, its timing, and its implications.

Doing it via a televised ‘address to the nation’ only, I feel, reinforces the drift towards ‘backstaging’ the parliament that was already evident during the Aznar presidency.
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Osama bin Laden’s new taped message has been getting a lot of airplay. I can’t quite see why. The only thing I find interesting about it is that he sent it to Al-Arabiya as well as Al-Jazeera, suggesting that he’s broadening his media channel. The idea that he had any intent or power to offer Europe any kind of truce, or that there there was ever any real prospect of European nations going along with it, is just too silly for words.

The core, essential, fundamental truth about terrorism is that it is a media strategy above all else. If terrorists could actually strike strategic targets, they wouldn’t have to be terrorists in order to further their aims. Von Clausewitz said that “war is nothing more than the continuation of politics by other means.” Well, terrorism is also the continuation of politics by other means. Both are about the application of violence to gain political goals, but while ordinary war is about the direct effects of organised violence on the military, economic and political structures of the state, terrorism is about the psychological effects of violence, particularly through mass fear.

A lot of people do get that, but they don’t seem to understand that this same logic applies to anti-terrorism. It is no less a matter of media strategy than terrorism is.
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I don’t know about you, but this sort of thing worries me:

The framework that has buttressed peace in the Taiwan Strait for decades is disintegrating. Changes in Taiwan, as well as some of Beijing’s counterproductive behavior, are undermining its foundations. Unless an improved framework is adopted soon, war across the strait will become increasingly probable …

The conundrum is stark. Taiwan sees itself as an “independent, sovereign country.” China, with a national fixation over a century long on achieving territorial unity, has staked the legitimacy of its regime on not allowing Taiwan juridical stature as a sovereign country. …

Each side at this point is pursuing efforts to change facts on the ground in its own favor. China is deploying additional missiles that can strike Taiwan … Taiwan is deepening its effort to instill a distinctive Taiwanese identity, strengthen its bona fides as an independent country and acquire offensive-weapon capabilities.

Especially when it’s written by very serious people.

So I wondered, does Europe have a policy for this eventuality?

I had a look here, here, and at the Commission’s Strategy Paper here. This last, unfortunately, devotes more space to Denmark’s bilateral aid for China (not that there’s anything wrong with Denmark’s bilateral aid, a friend of mine works in that section of their foreign ministry) than it does to Taiwan and what are delicately called cross-straits relations..

So I’m still wondering, does Europe have a policy for this eventuality? Should it? What does either choice say about Europe’s role in the world?