[UPDATED at the end of the entry.]
A few days ago I noted Alexei Bayer's Wall Street Journal op-ed on Russia, and specifically on the challenge he believes Russia presents to the US.
Today Knight-Ridder has an op-ed by Bonner Cohenof the National Center for Public Policy Research on Putin and his surprising recent embrace of the Kyoto treaty. What accounts for Putin's turnaround on this?
Did he react to a combination of relentless pressure and outright bribes from the United Kingdom, France and Germany - Kyoto's most ardent supporters in the European Union?Was he seeking to avert Western eyes from Russia's ruthless war against Islamic fundamentalists in Chechnya and other nations along its far-flung southern borders?
Was he promised favored visa status for Russian citizens traveling to Western Europe or expedited action on Russia's pending membership in the World Trade Organization?
Those are just a few of the questions pundits here and abroad are posing in the wake of recent reports that Russia is ready to sign on Kyoto's dotted line.
But anyone who has followed Putin's rapid ascent through the ranks of KGB to the throne room of the Kremlin will search for another explanation.The wily former spymaster may well be setting Kyoto's proponents up for one of history's grandest double-crosses by signing the treaty and grabbing the billions of dollars in promised payoffs with no intention of ever living up to its terms
After all, the only way for the European Union or the United Nations to really determine if Russia is complying with Kyoto is to site thousands of monitors on the ground in a vast territory that spans six time zones - or to rely on Russian self-certification.
The first option is not likely to be granted by the xenophobic Russians, while the statistics generated by the second are likely to be doctored beyond all credibility.
No one is his right mind thinks that Putin is stupid enough to actually believe that Russia will gain real benefits by scrupulously observing Kyoto's guidelines.
Indeed, his own economic adviser, Andrei Illarionov frequently has noted that Kyoto would "result in an economic holocaust for Russia." Illarionov calls the treaty a "broad-based assault" on economic growth, the environment and on "human civilization itself."
Then why on earth sign it? Cohen sees the old KGB leader at work:
If Russia cynically proceeds to ratify Kyoto, however, the treaty would go into effect in signatory nations - an action that undoubtedly would have severe economic ramifications for the United States.Although the United States backed away from the agreement after the Senate passed a rejecting resolution by a 95-0 vote in 1997, European Union nations would like nothing better than to enforce its terms on U.S. multinationals doing business abroad.
American corporations have an estimated 12,000 factories abroad, according to Bank of America economist Joseph Quinlan, and more than half are based in the EU, Canada and Japan, which already have ratified Kyoto.
By imposing higher costs and lower profits on U.S. enterprises overseas, America's chief trading rivals could put the brakes on our full-throttle economic recovery. ....
Recent studies by government and private sector economists show Kyoto would throw millions of Americans out of work, and cost the typical family here up to $3,600 a year in lost income. American motorists would pay through the hose at filling stations as already high energy prices soar another 30 to 86 percent.
By conforming to Kyoto's stringent terms, the U.S. Gross Domestic Product - the value of all goods and services produced - would have to shrink by $225 billion to $440 billion annually. That would quickly erase all of the benefits that flowed from President Bush's 10-year, $1.8 trillion tax-cut - and then some. As the astute economics columnist Tom Bray recently observed, Europe's harsh criticism of U.S. inaction on global warming stems more from vested financial interest than enlightened concern for the environment.
And it would allow Russia's dynamic brand of state capitalism to move forward at the expense of U.S. workers. If a Russian double-cross is imminent, Putin, alone among the world's leaders, will have a found a way to milk Kyoto for his own benefit.
"Any rollback in emissions necessarily would throw some very large grains of sand in the gears of the U.S. economy, the biggest energy user in the world," Bray noted earlier this month. That would permit Europe's moribund socialist economies to regain worldwide competitiveness without enduring the political pain of rolling back government handouts.
A prescient warning, or right wing paranoia?
It is true that the US is a major energy user and a major polluter.
It's also certainly true that the economic impact of the Kyoto treaty would disproportionately fall on US industries and hence the US economy, at least in the short- and mid-term. Longer term, we might hope that technological improvements would restart the economy.
And, multilateral treaties have been milked by others for profit in the past. France is a master at bringing home money from poorer EU countries to subsidize its own farmers, for instance.
Cohen doesn't comment on the timing of Putin's Kyoto embrace, but it began last April, not long after US moves in Georgia and the 'Stans - and culminated after summit negotiations resulting in EU approval for Russia to join the World Trade Organization. That timing suggests to me that Cohen is on to something important here.
UPDATE: There's nothing unique about Kyoto as a venue for trade wars, by the way.
MORE UPDATE: Of course, if you're of the opinion that Britain is currently a dictatorship, you might also believe that Putin is America's poodle.
Bush's support for changing some of our energy consumption patterns, particularly support for Hydrogen based fuel, has always seemed somewhat out of place to me.
Yes, it would gain him some political captial and it would reduce our dependence on the Middle East and particularly Saudi, both of which I believe Bush would see as highly desireable. However, this never seemed adaquate to me.
Reading this article gave me a large "Ah Ha!" moment. I now think that he is trying to re-align us to mitiagte some of the issues and threats raised in this article WITHOUT the potential industrial and stock market disruptions Kyoto would have brought.
Even some of the emissions standards roll backs that have occured to power generation plants could play into that. If his people have quietly had a word with the management telling them that they'll get a break, but if they expect to stay in business with the upcomming changes, they'd better use the capital the delay in compliance gets them.
Either I am reading a lot of stuff that isn't there, or there are some very subtle political plays being done here at home, even if they cause a short term pain for Bush to align us for long term success.
StargazerA5
Am I understanding this right? Eurpoe wants to hurt the US economy be making US owned plants in Eurpoe less competitive? If this is what the article means, then I'm confused
Seems like this could hurt US companies short term, but it would have a much larger impact on the European economy. These factories would lose market share, and then would have to reduce their European work force. In fact, the whole thing would be an incentive for US companies to shift production to cheaper sources, in Asia perhaps. US companies are the master at Globalization, if costs rise in one region, there's always another.
OT: Congratulations to the Black Knights on their long overdue yet well deserved victory!
Yes - a big HOOAH to Coach Ross and to the Army team!
Re: Europe and economic impacts, I suspect the thinking is that if US-owned factories close, they will be taken over and run by EU owners. (Hey, it's not my analysis. OTOH, the EU does use regulation as a part of trade wars so the idea isn't farfetched.)
No one is his right mind thinks that Putin is stupid enough to actually believe that Russia will gain real benefits by scrupulously observing Kyoto's guidelines.
Perhaps Russia decided that having some sort of political process in place is better than just waiting for catastrophe?
One day there's going to be a climatic 9/11, and there won't be any Afghanistan to bomb.
The commitment to hydrogen makes sense when you figure out that making good on the Bush's commitment to democratizing the non-integrating Gap is going to fail absent a big increase in their energy use. Shifting to a common energy storage and transmission medium like hydrogen is going to provide large increases in efficiency as cheap energy in one area (say cheap hydroelectric) will be bought up for its hydrogen value and transported elsewhere instead of being sucked down into one more stupid aluminum facility, adding to the glut. Stranded energy will become a thing of the past.
As for Putin, there will be huge incentives to cheat but it's not going to work. The way to make money on the treaty is to sell your excess pollution credits and those contracts are going to be run through, and verified by, a market.
This is nuts.
Don't know where you dragged this guy Cohen out from, but on this issue at least, he's a raving nutter.
from a bio in a report he authored:
Cohen "joined the Lexington Institute as a senior fellow in 1999. Dr. Cohen has lectured and participated in panels dealing with environmental issues in the United States and abroad and is a frequent commentator on television and radio programs. He was the editor for Environment & Climate News.
Together with Steve Milloy, Cohen has served as editor of American Values: an Environmental Vision, an anthology published by the Environmental Policy Analysis Network in 1996. Articles by Dr. Cohen have appeared in Forbes, the Weekly Standard, National Review, Investor’s Business Daily, Journal of Commerce, Washington Times, Earth Times, and other publications," the note states.
"His previous positions include that of research associate at the Stiftung, Germany Wissenschaft und Politik (Foundation for Science and Policy)in Ebenhausen,Germany and as a German-language lecturer for the United States Information Agency (USIA), in Germany. Dr. Cohen holds a Ph.D.—summa cum laude—from the University of Munich and a B.A. from the University of Georgia," the biographical note states.
Robert, I've seen claims on both sides of the issue re: economic impact of Kyoto. Can you provide a reference to the models you cite? I'd like to know more about this issue and a good place to start would be to know the assumptions behind the models used for predicting these impacts.
First, a partial retraction.
. . . the models agree, abatement would be most costly for Japan, less for Europe, less again for the US.
This used to be true, but no longer. Japan still has the highest marginal abatement cost, but the US would have the highest total cost, because it would have more abatement to do, having grown more rapidly than Europe and Japan since 1990.
Robin Burk:
Together with Steve Milloy, Cohen has served as editor of American Values . . .
Steve Milloy? Heard that name somewhere.
Can you provide a reference to the models you cite?
Erm, I didn't actually cite any, but here are a few I maybe should have:
I too, can't make much sense of his argument that Kyoto is an anti-American plot. You also might want to check the Disinfopedia page on the National Center for Public Policy Research -- it seems that Exxon specifically funds their anti-Kyoto activities.
Inspired by Tim Lambert, and a closer reading of Cohen's article, a more detailed response:
The article does have two sound premises. The Kyoto Protocol would be negative for Russia economically, because it would tend to lower energy prices, and Russia is an energy exporter. (Also, Russia could use a bit of warming.) The unusual thing about Russia's circumstances is that Kyoto would cost it not through Russia's own abatement action but through the action of its trading partners. But it's true that climate change mitigation is not a cause that inspires Russia.
The other sound premise is that Russia has indeed been bargaining with Europe and the USA, seeking to sell its "vote" on Kyoto for the highest price.
The suggestion that Putin's plan is to avoid the costs of Kyoto by cheating on Russia's obligations makes no sense. This is because, since Russia's emissions are already below its Kyoto ceiling, it doesn't have any abatement obligations (it might get some if it grows fast enough between now and 2012, but nothing substantial). The negatives for Kyoto for Russia are from other countries' using less oil and gas, and Russian cheating can't affect that.
More likely explanations for Russia's accession are:
The claim that Kyoto is a plan to "throw sand in the gears of the US eonomy" and "permit Europe's . . . economies to regain . . . competitiveness" is nuts.
The simple and obvious explanation for the European stance, that the Europeans actually believe that global warming is a problem, and are willing to incur some costs to deal with it, Cohen nowhere mentions.
One more strange claim in the article: Cohen says that "The treaty's term would force the U.S. to pare greenhouse gas emissions by some 30 percent below 1990 levels." Since this is one of the most basic facts about the subject, it's surprising that he gets it wrong. The US target is to reduce emissions 7 per cent below 1990 levels. Taking account of subsequent and expected emissions growth, this is equivalent to 30 per cent below compliance period (2008-12) estimated levels.
Considering that Kyoto, if implemented, would have a very insignificant effect upon global warming according to every projection I have seen about its impact (if it is even indeed the case that CO2 emission is the cause, someting that is in dispute), I cannot help but think that there must be some other motive which is less than selfless behind the movement and the vehement criticism of the United States for failing to ratify it.
If you're looking for motives behind this movement, the issue of whether Kyoto would have an adverse impact on the US economy is irrelevant. The real question is whether the governments pushing it BELIEVE it would have such an effect, and I think there is some evidence to support such a notion.
The United States is indeed a threat to the world, but I would submit that the threat is one of contrast to the economic and political systems which most of the world lives under. Even in the so-called first world, the per capita income gap between the inhabitants of the US and the EU is widening, and not in the EU's favor. A system which out performs the semi-socialist welfare states of Europe is a definite threat to the political elites there, as well as to the livelihoods of the substantial masses of government workers who administer such states. Doing what they can to put a brake on the US economy is a logical strategy to maintain their political power.