By Ian Bremmer

When Yemen makes international headlines, it's usually because outsiders look at the unrest there as yet another proxy conflict between regional heavyweights Saudi Arabia and Iran. It's one more version of the Sunni vs. Shia Middle East story. The Saudis are supporting Yemen's government in a fight with Shia Houthi rebels financed and trained by Iran. The Saudi, Yemeni, and Iranian governments each have their motives for feeding this simplification.

The Houthis are a Shia rebel group in northern Yemen, centered in the city of Saada. They've warned for years that they've been politically and economically marginalized by Yemen's government, and Houthi rebels launched a rebellion in 2004. There have been six rounds of fighting since. In August of this year, the Yemeni government, with Saudi support, launched another battle against the Houthis, and the conflict has spilled across the border into Saudi Arabia, where Houthis have fought pitched firefights with Saudi forces. In response, the Saudis have launched bombing raids on Houthi positions inside northern Yemen. Tens of thousands of people have fled the expanding conflict zone.

The spike in violence is now getting the regional attention it deserves-but for the wrong reasons. Yemen's weak government already has its hands full with a growing threat from al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) and increasing secessionist pressures in the south, adding to the risk that Yemen will become a failed state. The refugee problem is creating a risk of social unrest inside Saudi Arabia. These are serious issues. Less serious is the fear, fanned by both Saudi and Iranian officials, that Iran wants to use the Houthis to create an Arabian version of Hizbullah, a direct Shia threat to Saudi territory. The Saudis are playing up this threat to justify cross-border attacks into Yemen. Yemen's government is using the threat to justify its willingness to accept Saudi attacks on Yemeni soil and to gain Western military support and financial help. Iran feeds the story to pose as increasingly influential within the region.

The Houthis, though, have no reason to play along. They follow the Zaidi form of Islam. They're technically Shia, but theologically and historically distinct from Iran's Twelver Shia majority, which has cultural connections in Lebanon and (to a lesser extent) in Iraq -- but not in Yemen. The Houthi rebels need guns and cash and can't be picky about where they get them. If Iran is willing to sell, they're willing to buy. That doesn't mean they will use them to advance Iranian interests in Saudi Arabia's backyard.

In Yemen, at least, all militancy is local. Few outside al Qaeda relish the idea of the world's largest oil-producer sharing a border with a failed state. That's a risk worth worrying about, but it's not a good reason to over-simplify a complex political, economic, ethnic, religious, and social problem into some sort of regional proxy war between Sunni and Shia.

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By Jun Okumura and Ross Schaap

The conventional wisdom in U.S.-Japanese relations is that things were largely fine until the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) upset the apple cart by winning control of Japan's government. Security policy observers appear to accept the idea that the DPJ has strained the close relationship that Japan's former ruling party, the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) had developed with the United States over the past several decades. A show of bilateral solidarity during President Obama's one-night stand in Tokyo last week has done little to change these opinions. The conventional wisdom has it wrong.

The source of this mistaken belief centers on the DPJ's electoral promise to review the 2006 U.S.-Japanese agreement that would move the bulk of a US Marine base out of the center of Ginowan, a city of nearly 100,000 in Okinawa, to Guam. The remainder -- a large contingency of helicopters-would relocate to a more remote location near Nago, also within Okinawa. The DPJ's indecision on whether to move ahead with construction of a new airfield above a coral reef near Nago seems to have thrown a wrench in the works, but the real difference between the DPJ and the LDP is simply in the visibility of its reluctance to give Washington what it wants.

The disconnect here is in overestimation of cooperation from the LDP. The long history of this redeployment headache gets left out of most accounts of the current controversy. The initial U.S. force redeployment deal was agreed in 1996, and the new airfield and redeployment were supposed to be completed by 2004. Instead, after seven years without progress, both sides went back to the bargaining table, a process that eventually yielded the 2006 agreement. Yet, more than three years of LDP rule later, authorization of construction at the airfield still falls to the new DPJ government. In other words, the LDP agreed to give the United States what it wanted ... and then did virtually nothing to make it happen.

So what has changed? The DPJ, not to mention its coalition partner the Social Democratic Party of Japan, is much more openly antagonistic to the 2006 agreement. The visibility of that reluctance has moved the US to respond publicly on an issue that slid by without action on a much lower profile during the Bush years. Unusually blunt public statements from US Defense Secretary Robert Gates, insisting on quick implementation of the 2006 agreement, generated headlines -- and much chatter on bilateral strains. Though the Obama administration appears to have taken a step back, agreeing to set up a joint working group on the Ginowan issue, it continues to reject the one alternative that the Japanese Foreign Minister has been pursuing on his own -- moving the Marine helicopters to Kadena Air Base, an idea which the locals also reject.

That the United States started from a position of intransigence on renegotiation isn't remarkable. But this doesn't mean that's where the issue will end. The U.S. side has waited 13 years; it has no practical reasons to reject a technically and politically viable alternative even if it means a few more years of delay. In fact, further delay is the next likely course of action/inaction. The two sides have been stuck on the status quo conundrum for 13 years for reasons we can only guess at, but likely include operational requirements that leave little or no room for a non-Okinawa solution, while no other viable Okinawa alternative is in sight.

That said, the DPJ's political links to the anti-U.S. military presence in Okinawa, the SDP presence in the coalition, and the unfortunate political calendar, including a mayoral election in January in Nago and an Upper House election in the summer of 2010, are making it exceedingly difficult for the DPJ leadership to make up its mind to accept the lesser evil and give the go-ahead to construction work at Nago.

All this dictates the continuation of the status quo. But then, such a turn of events -- or the lack of one -- should not come as a surprise. In reality, history shows that for U.S.-Japanese relations, there's much less difference between the DPJ and LDP than meets the eye -- in principle or in practice.

Jun Okumura is a senior adviser to Eurasia Group and Ross Schaap is Director of Comparative Analytics.

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By Ian Bremmer

President Obama embarks today on a tour of East Asia, a region central to U.S. geopolitical interests and its economic recovery. The primary goal is "strategic reassurance," a term Deputy Secretary of State Jim Steinberg has used to describe U.S. relations with China.

On Friday, he'll reassure Japan's brand new Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama that, despite well-publicized recent frictions in U.S.-Japanese relations and a broader U.S. engagement with China, his administration considers ties with Japan a cornerstone of U.S. foreign policy. And he'll seek some reassurance that the new DPJ government isn't about to revisit key assumptions in the relationship. Hatoyama will likely take the opportunity to "clarify" his view on the importance of the security partnership. Throw in a highly publicized Obama speech on Saturday, and we can expect an easing of suspicion and a lot of warm smiles, especially since the two sides now appear to have a deal on a joint-commission to resolve the Okinawa troops and base relocation issues.

On Sunday, Obama will be in Singapore, where he'll reassure Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong that the US isn't planning on reducing its Asian presence anytime soon. He'll then join the festivities at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit. During the meetings, there will be early discussion of an "Asian Economic Community" and rumors that Obama is involved in discussion with ASEAN leaders on a U.S.-ASEAN free trade agreement -- though he'll more likely simply be offering reassurance that his government hasn't set its trade agenda on indefinite hold. The meeting will end with public pledges from all sides to reject protectionism, the sort of empty reassurances we've seen in recent months at G20 meetings in Washington and London. Much of the media focus will be on the silk shirts and blouses inspired by Singapore's Peranakan culture that the leaders will be wearing.

More interesting are the side meetings that we'll hear much less about. Obama is scheduled to sit down with Myanmar's prime minister to reassure him that the United States is willing to engage the country's military junta if there's any prospect that engagement might yield results. Back home, Obama will reassure critics in Washington that he won't move to lift sanctions until Myanmar's generals offer something of substance. He's also scheduled to meet with Indonesian President Yudhoyono to assure him that the U.S. views the emerging regional player as a valuable local partner, and with Russia's President Medvedev to assure him that his administration is serious about improving strained relations with Moscow.

On Monday, Obama heads for Shanghai and Beijing for a three-day visit that includes some sightseeing and a Q&A with Chinese students around meetings with President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao. The talking points for these sessions are nearly as ambitious as what you'd expect from one of those G20 meetings. There will be discussion of the recently contentious U.S.-Chinese trade relationship, energy, human rights, stability in Pakistan and Afghanistan, and the nuclear programs in North Korea and Iran. Obama can reassure China's leaders that he seeks mutually profitable engagement with the one subject he's NOT likely to bring up: The value of China's currency. The Chinese wouldn't welcome the discussion, and Obama has no interest in inviting the Chinese to comment on the state of the U.S. economy and Washington's role in it.

If there's any tangible progress from Obama's time in China, it will be on climate change/green energy issues. There may well be an agreement to expand joint development and investment in renewable energy technology. It won't be a true "breakthrough," but given the low likelihood that anything especially important comes out of climate change meetings in Copenhagen next month, the Obama team will use any sign of modest progress to reassure skeptics of his commitment on the issue and to tout the trip as a success.

On the way home, Obama will stop off in Seoul to tell South Korean President Lee Myung-bak that KORUS, the U.S.-South Korean free trade agreement, isn't dead. He'll also reassure Lee that, though the US won't reduce troop levels on the peninsula, Washington can help make their stay a little easier for South Korea's government to manage.

Ian Bremmer is president of Eurasia Group.

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By Sean West

Policymakers appear puzzled by massive Wall Street payouts. Why are the banks paying such large salaries and bonuses amid such political and public sensitivity to the issue?

There are a few possible explanations. They could be enjoying one last hurrah before a new regulatory regime changes their ability to earn blockbuster profits. Or they could be showing Congress and the administration, both of which demonized the industry earlier this year, that there's nothing either can do to stop them. Or perhaps it's much simpler: Pay is how bankers measure success, so firms will go to any length to retain top talent. Even if self-regulation could go a long way to currying political favor in Washington, don't expect it from Wall Street. But massive payouts after a year of taxpayer support at a time when unemployment is over 10 percent seems like a recipe for populist backlash. So how likely is another bout of populism in response to bankers' compensation? There will be plenty of opportunities to find out in coming months.

In recent months, anger at bank pay has subsided as the administration has tried to bureaucratize the issue by appointing a "Pay Czar" and Congress has remained focused on healthcare. In March, Congress lurched into action over bonuses at AIG. Only a handful of votes away from passing draconian bonus clawback legislation, Congress earned its highest approval rating this session: 37 percent. But few members have said much on the subject since then. The White House and Treasury have followed a similar path: cognizant of a perception that the administration was becoming too interventionist, they bureaucratized the issue by appointing Kenneth Feinberg to review pay packages at banks receiving exceptional aid in order to protect taxpayer investments. Part of the calculation is to create an environment for the banks to remain competitive, which includes retaining talent that demands market-rate compensation. It was no surprise that his first set of rulings, which applied to the top 25 highest-paid employees at each of the seven largest TARP-recipient banks, got big headlines but had a relatively limited real impact.

Even if the issue is downplayed in the near term by a light-touch Pay Czar, it will be a long time before bankers are out of the woods. For starters, bankers' pay may again become a political lightening rod as Congress focuses on financial regulation reform package through early next year. This is particularly true if Obama begins to feel threatened by rising unemployment or if he senses that he is losing his base and needs to deflect anger. In that case, look out for fireworks as an election year Congress turns its attention to financial regulation in the first quarter of 2010.

It's not just up to the Treasury Department or Congress though. Banking regulators like the Federal Reserve are trying to get in front of the issue to prove their competence and preserve their current powers -- and whatever Congress passes, it will be up to the regulators to interpret and implement. Plus, a whole new round of legislating may follow from the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, which will unveil its report on what caused the market turmoil at the end of 2010. While Feinberg may be more of a technocrat than a czar, significant risk remains for a populist-driven response to bankers' pay going forward.

Sean West is a U.S. policy analyst at Eurasia Group.

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By Ian Bremmer

Two years ago, there was a debate in Washington about whether a strong Europe or a weak Europe was preferable. There's no disagreement today. A more multilateral U.S. foreign policy needs a stronger Europe. As the G20 weakens the West's global strategic position, the United States will increasingly need coherent policies from its principal allies to maintain its international influence and leadership. Europe, however, appears to be fragmenting.

Witness Germany moving away from EU fiscal targets, which will make it harder for the European Commission to compel other countries to develop credible and consistent fiscal policy. Meanwhile, European tax policy changes need to be implemented to cover the costs of interventions, stimulus packages, and revenue shortfalls-but they have barely begun. Upcoming elections in the United Kingdom could produce major ripple effects next year. And the risk of a complete breakdown in negotiations over Turkey's bid to join the EU could further divide the continent.

Overall, political issues will be tougher to deal with in 2010 than they were at the height of the economic crisis. As things unraveled in late 2008 to early 2009, governments had no choice but to use existing policy tools. Now they may have to take up the difficult task of developing new ones.

The European agenda next year will be full of challenges, many of which require policy coordination. There will be impediments to effectively managing a crisis in a truly pan-European bank; uncertainty over corporate refinancing, particularly in eastern Europe; and emerging political problems combined with social discontent as the difficult tasks of footing the bill for crisis responses become more pressing. At this point, a real move toward greater European consolidation looks like it's still a long way off.

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By Ian Bremmer

As President Obama works toward finalizing a new plan for Afghanistan, here are five reasons why the challenges U.S. forces face in building stability there are more formidable than those in Iraq:

1) Political legitimacy. Parliamentary elections in Iraq scheduled for January will spark violence, the results will create controversy, and the eventual leaders will take their places within a system that pits lawmakers and cabinet ministers against one another in a more-or-less direct struggle for power. But voters will turn out in large numbers, and Iraq's new political institutions are slowly developing a broad popular legitimacy. That's not true in Afghanistan, which might have been better off without elections earlier this year. Virtually no one believes President Hamid Karzai won the August vote; few will embrace him when he claims victory following the November 7 run-off. He may hold the office, but he has virtually no natural political base in the country. Karzai is not exactly a reliable partner in efforts to build lasting stability.

2) Training of local forces. U.S. forces have had real success in helping the Iraqi government build its police and security forces. The large-scale drawdown of U.S. troops beginning next year will create a power vacuum that encourages battles over political turf and control of oil revenues. We've seen an uptick in violence in recent weeks, and we'll see more in months to come. Corruption remains a serious problem. But the Iraqi government has shown considerable progress over the past year in asserting control over territory and in beating back challenges from insurgents. In Afghanistan, there's almost no local support for a national professionalized military. Because Karzai's government has so little legitimacy, and few local leaders believe he can offer protection against Taliban attacks, very few people are lining up to don a uniform and pick up a rifle.

3) International coordination. In the battle against insurgents in Iraq, the United States has called most of the shots -- with significant (though now more modest) help from Great Britain. American and British forces have been well coordinated from the start, both operationally and strategically. Afghanistan's International Security Assistance Force has included troops from 43 countries with widely varying degrees of professionalism, morale and operational capability. Short of the U.S. military accepting responsibility for the entire mission, there's no short-term fix here.

4) Tribal/warlord patronage networks. More than any other factor, the willingness of Sunni tribal leaders to partner with U.S. forces against a common external enemy has been central to improvements in Iraq's security over the past two and a half years. In Afghanistan, tribal leaders and local warlords face US requests for help against a domestic foe, the Taliban, with whom they may find themselves negotiating long after NATO forces have left the country.

5) Resource base. Iraq has enormously underdeveloped oil reserves, a relatively well-educated urban elite, a population with some limited but real sense of national identity, and a favorable geographical position for development of trade and investment ties with other countries in the region and beyond. For the foreseeable future, the bulk of Afghanistan's cash will come from foreign aid and opium production. Neither offers much hope as a source of long-term stability.

Iraq's government has a long way to go before it can function as a set of independent, secure and self-confident institutions and as guarantor of Iraq's long-term stability. But in Afghanistan, it will be years before local leaders can move from coping with serious problems to solving them. 

Ian Bremmer is president of Eurasia Group.

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By Kim Iskyan

There's a reason for the popular perception that Russians like their drink: The average Russian citizen consumes 18 liters of pure alcohol per year, compared with about 11 liters per year in Western Europe. But if President Dmitry Medvedev's new anti-drinking campaign is a success, Russians will be toasting a lot less often.

Russian history is littered with failed attempts by imperious leaders with a social engineering streak to interfere in Russians' tippling habits. The most recent effort, the mid-1980s anti-drinking campaign spearheaded by Mikhail Gorbachev, was abandoned in part because it was hugely unpopular.

But the Kremlin has good reason to try again. Russia's drinking problem, which Medvedev has called a "national disaster," has long been cited as a key cause of Russia's ongoing demographic collapse. Alcohol abuse is a key reason why Russian men have a life expectancy of just 60 years, on par with North Korea and Papua New Guinea. In no small part due to alcohol abuse, the U.N. forecasts that Russia's population will fall from the current 142 million to 131 million by 2025, endangering economic growth and national security over the long term.

Medvedev has charged the government with developing an anti-drinking strategy by Dec. 1. Media reports suggest it may include new restrictions on advertising for alcoholic beverages; tightened regulations for low-alcohol content beverages; limitations on the times and locations at which alcoholic beverages can be sold; and price floors for and increased taxes on vodka. The plan will include additional measures to reduce Russia's gray alcohol market. The government is also contemplating whether to re-establish its monopoly on distilled spirits used to make vodka.

The campaign's chances of success may be better than previous Russian battles with the bottle. Some polls have suggested broad support for a temperance campaign. From a fiscal perspective, the relative contribution to the federal budget of alcohol taxation is a small fraction today of what it was during previous attempts to crack down on alcohol consumption, ensuring that lower consumption wouldn't dramatically decrease government revenue. It might even boost government coffers via higher taxes. Finally, the apparent success in the government's effort to eradicate legalized gambling -- as of July 1, all casinos and slot machine parlors operating outside four specified zones were closed -- reflects considerable political will to engineer positive social change, which could be channeled into an anti-alcohol effort.

Russia's anti-alcohol campaign is still in its very early stages. The politically powerful alcohol lobby, wary of higher taxes, could dilute the effort. And there are a lot more Russians drinking than gambling.

Kim Iskyan is a Europe and Eurasia analyst at Eurasia Group

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By Ian Bremmer

The most obvious long-term effect of the financial crisis is a shift in economic decision-making power from capitals of finance to capitals of politics. We see this trend in the United States, where decisions on how best to value assets and allocate capital are now made in Washington on a scale unthinkable until about this time last year. Outside the United States, nowhere is this development more obvious than in the United Arab Emirates, where power and wealth have shifted at startling speed from Dubai (until recently a financial powerhouse) to Abu Dhabi (the seat of political power). But the American trend is temporary; the UAE's might not be.

Remember when newspapers, magazines, and TV business reports produced feature after feature on lavish investment in Dubai's newest architectural marvel and the corporatist management style of its ruler, Sheikh Mohammed al Maktoum? As foreign investment stopped flowing into Dubai, large-scale infrastructure projects ground to a halt. Thousands of foreigners lost work permits in the construction sector. Thousands more saddled with loans they could no longer repay simply abandoned their property and left the country. By January 2009, local police complained that about 3000 cars had been abandoned at the airport. Dubai found itself buried beneath a mountain of IOUs, and for a few days in February 2009, the financial world lost faith. The emirate's credit rating tanked, and foreign investors began to plan for the once unimaginable risk that Dubai would default on its sovereign debt.

Faced with that, Dubai announced a $20 billion bond program to raise the needed cash. In February 2009, Abu Dhabi moved in with $10 billion bailout, underwritten by the UAE's central bank. So far, Dubai has yet to find the other $10 billion, and Abu Dhabi may have to step in again. But the bursting of Dubai's real estate bubble and the sudden collapse of its economy have already allowed Abu Dhabi's ruling al Nahayan family to buy a big share of the al Maktoum's assets.

On a recent visit, I saw the evidence for myself. Abu Dhabi is bustling as the city state prepares for its first Formula One championship this Sunday.  In Dubai, the traffic jams are gone, the hotels are struggling, and everyone's waiting for something to change. What a difference a year makes.

There's plenty of reason to fear that things won't get better soon. Real estate prices are now at about half their peak, but overbuilding on many projects continues because the state controls many of the emirate's largest construction companies. Many of Dubai's biggest construction projects are still underway, because the government wants to minimize further job losses. That's likely to continue through 2010, leaving the emirate with large amounts of unused commercial space.

In many cases, local firms haven't paid their employees in weeks, and there have been some moderately violent protests. The government appears aware of the seriousness of the problem and is working to improve healthcare and living facilities for the laborers. Dangerous levels of unrest are unlikely given that most guest workers can't afford to risk deportation.  

But there's another cloud on the horizon. If the United States moves to intensify sanctions on Iran next year (a good bet given the low likelihood that the current diplomatic optimism will last), Dubai will be vulnerable. Much of Iran's financial flows move through Dubai, and sanctions would hit the emirate especially hard.

Ian Bremmer is president of Eurasia Group.

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