I'm the farthest thing from an expert on Mali and I'm still catching up on events there after my Asia trip, so what follows is tentative and should be taken with appropriate skepticism. Based on what I've read so far, however, here are my initial comments and queries.

1. Remember Libya? NATO intervention in Libya is hardly the only reason that there is trouble today in Mali, but it's not irrelevant either. Why? Because arms flows from Qaddafi's collapsing state fueled the Tuareg insurgency in northern Mali and contributed to the collapse of the central government. Qaddafi's ouster is still worthy of celebration on its own terms, but the effects on Mali remind us that even positive developments in one place can have negative repercussions elsewhere. And if events continue deteriorate in Mali, the net benefit of NATO's decision to go for regime change in Libya will look dicier.

2. What is the U.S. national interest? What exactly is the U.S. "strategic interest" in Mali? It's not natural resources, despite what you sometimes hear. It's not "counter-terrorism" per se, unless you believe that all extremists have to be hounded into submission no matter where they are located, what their aims and capabilities are, and what it would cost to subdue them. More than anything else, the Western lurch into Mali shows the recurring tendency for great powers (or even medium powers like France) to get involved in places first and then define them as "vital interests" later. In other words, a place becomes "strategic" or "vital" if some great power gets engaged there, no matter where it is located, what its resources or capabilities are, or how its present or future ondition might actually affect the livelihood or security of the intervening power. Put differently: if Mali can be seen as a vital interest, then anywhere can.

3. What has the United States been up to there? Ever since the opening of Africa Command, the United States military has been actively partnering with various regimes, conducting drone strikes and special operations (in a few places) and training activities (in many). What's worrisome is that the imbroglio in Mali occurred even though the U.S. military has had an active training mission there for some time. Unfortunately, that effort apparently failed to produce either a fully loyal fighting force or a fully effective one. Some individuals who received U.S. training have now joined the rebel forces, and the troops that remained to the government haven't fought very well against them. Which raises the question of whether Africa Command's overall approach to building a more stable Africa is working. I'd like to know if the Pentagon understood that its efforts in Mali weren't going very well before this latest round of trouble began; that's certainly not the impression one gets from Africa Command's website.

4. The "Safe Haven" Myth Lives! Perhaps not surprisingly, the justification for military intervention is similar to the one that Barack Obama offered for escalation in Afghanistan in 2009: it's the need to prevent Mali from becoming a "safe haven" that could be used to organize attacks elsewhere (i.e., on France itself). But is there any real evidence that the extremists in Mali are plotting to attack France, the United States, or anyone else? Even if they were, is there good evidence that they have the will and the skill to carry out such activities, or that the consequences of a successful attack would be greater than the costs of French (and other) efforts to root them out? And is it possible that intervention in Mali might actually focus the extremists' attention on the intervenors, instead of the central government? These questions do not necessarily add up to a hard-and-fast rejection of intervention, but they should give us pause.

5. Is popular support sufficient justification? Press reports (including Drezner here) suggest that there is considerable popular support for Western intervention among Mali's population. If true, this aspect of the case is simultaneously: a) not surprising, b) reassuring, and c) not dispositive. If the local population were strongly opposed, then intervention would be a fool's errand. But the mere fact that the local population wants well-armed outsiders to protect them does not by itself mean that it is in the outsiders' interest to provide this service. And populations who are initially grateful for foreign intervention have an unfortunate tendency to change their minds over time, particularly if the conflict escalates and if the foreigners overstay their welcome.

To repeat: I'm just getting up to speed on this conflict and the above is preliminary. Frankly, I hope the issue is resolved quickly and that I don't need to learn more about it. Why? Because I usually end up learning a lot about global problems when they prove to be enduring, protracted and difficult and when they are accompanied by lots of blunders. For our sake, France's sake, and most of all the sake of Mali's people, I hope this turns out to be a very short-lived affair. I'll bet President Hollande wants that even more than I do.

On the eve of the EU Summit, Mark Sheetz offers the following commentary, which differs in some respects from mine. 

In several recent blogs on the euro crisis, Stephen Walt has expressed exasperation with European leaders and pessimism on the fate of the eurozone. His reaction is understandable and consistent with virtually all journalists and economists who study the issue. They are frustrated at the slow pace of European decision-making and the fact that a solution seems obvious. In recent days, demand for action has become nearly hysterical, with analysts, columnists, and editorial writers for the New York Times suggesting that time for a solution is "running short," that "the endgame is fast approaching," that the eurozone is facing a "meltdown," and that a collapse is "perhaps inevitable."

So, what is the solution? Conventional economic wisdom insists that either Germany acquiesce to some sort of bailout or the eurozone is finished. Germany must consent either (a) to the issuance of joint and severally liable Eurobonds or (b) to a policy of monetary easing by the European Central Bank (ECB). The problem is being treated as a technocratic economic matter.  Hence, technocrats have come to power in Greece and Italy. But the matter is essentially political and the crisis turns on central problems of international relations theory, like anarchy, sovereignty, and power.   

Economists believe that the basic problem of the eurozone is economic: that national economic imbalances can no longer be restored through the traditional method of currency devaluation.  But the problems of the eurozone are fundamentally political: (a) it expanded too fast, wider won out over deeper, (b) there is no commitment to common budgetary policies, and (c) there is no mechanism to enforce agreements.

The debate is congealing around two poles, a pessimistic pole predicting the breaking apart of the eurozone versus an optimistic pole of closer integration. The solution includes both. On the one hand, wide economic disparity among members of the eurozone will force weaker members to leave. Greece, as well as those countries that use the euro but cannot afford it (PIGS), will be cast off from the eurozone by a mounting centrifugal force.

On the other hand, the remaining members will converge on tighter economic policy along the German model. As a corollary to more restricted membership, those countries remaining in the eurozone will harmonize their policies regarding deficits and government pensions and achieve some sort of convergence in the major items affecting budget deficits. This will have the effect of bringing Europe closer together, or at least those countries that can achieve convergence. It may also create a more politically coherent Europe, with those remaining in the eurozone leading the European Union economically and politically. Such a situation might even give a common foreign policy the chance to develop and cohere around a small group of stronger European countries.

Some believe that a Greek expulsion from the eurozone will be catastrophic. They assume that a Greek default within the eurozone is manageable, while a Greek exit would make contagion worse. My own feeling is that contagion -- and the accompanying collapse of the European project -- would be the result of Greece staying in the euro, not the result of Greece getting out.  The recent evidence of market contagion to Italy and Spain appears to support this claim. A referendum in Greece would have cleared the air. It would have restored a stark reality that European leaders would not be able to evade. If Greeks had voted "no" on the referendum, Greece would have had little choice but to return to the drachma. That would have been a lesson to others. They would have recognized that they have only two choices: (a) converge fiscal and monetary policies or (b) press the "eject" button. The problem now is that European leaders may still think they can muddle through by patching up a country here and there. That will destroy the clarity exposed by a Greek default.

The divide, as usual, is between France and Germany over monetary policy. The French, along with their southern European allies in Greece, Italy, Spain, and Portugal, favor easy money, while the Germans, along with northern Europeans in the Netherlands, Austria, and Finland, insist on a tight money policy. Any hint of German capitulation to French demands of easier money will be the end of the euro. The first sign of wavering, the first inkling that a compromise is afoot, will signal to the markets that the floodgates for a river of euros are open, that fiscal and monetary discipline are history, that inflation will be rampant, and that the euro will be worthless.

Germans will not pay for the profligacy of their neighbors. Otherwise, where would it stop? Any concession towards easy money will only reinforce the "moral hazard" of further risk-accepting behavior. It is a story as old as Aesop: the ant and the grasshopper. Germany entered into the euro under assurances that all members would conduct their economic affairs responsibly. If this is no longer the case, then Germany will reserve the right to withdraw. A former British chancellor of the exchequer agrees, insisting that Germany would sooner withdraw from the euro than see its integrity compromised. Another (not insignificant) factor is the survival of Angela Merkel as chancellor. Any suggestion of Merkel wavering at the prospect of easy money is tantamount to political suicide. So all the speculation that the ECB or the EFSF will "stabilize" (rescue) the euro is so much folderol.

The power calculus, then, favors Germany. France will be dragged along kicking and screaming, but two points suggest eventual French capitulation. One is that Germany will otherwise threaten to secede from the euro, which would put France in a nasty competitive economic position. And the second is that, without the unity embodied in a common currency, French hopes of ever again exerting influence on the world scene will have evaporated. Europeans understand that they cannot meet global challenges as individual nations because they are no longer great powers. As President Sarkozy conceded, "If Europe does not change quickly enough, global history will be written without Europe."

The original path to the common currency was through a convergence of economic policies. Nations would have budget deficits of no more than 3 percent of GDP, and total debt of no more than 60 percent of GDP. If euro members had stuck to these criteria, they would be in dandy shape now. So a return to that mechanism, with additional penalties for non-compliance, might work. The problem is to create binding agreements.

On the question of enforcement, one possibility mentioned is an automatic increase in taxes to offset a budget deficit beyond acceptable limits. Other devices to ensure compliance with EU oversight of national budgets are available for the same purpose. These sanctions would be imposed by a central authority that can override national budget decisions. The European Court of Justice and the European Commission have been suggested as ultimate arbiters, but such supranational enforcement has its limits in a union of sovereign states.

Sovereign governments may oppose such measures for domestic political reasons. As long as sovereignty remains, national governments may negate previous agreements. Even within national governments, as in the U.S. Congress, existing legislatures may negate the agreements of previous legislatures. Therefore, a more severe penalty is required. 

The ultimate penalty for non-compliance is, of course, expulsion. The eurozone could expel any country that fails -- after a suitable time period -- to adhere to budgetary guidelines set forth in a new agreement. The ultima ratio of economic union is expulsion, just as the ultima ratio of politics is war. It lurks behind every decision as the final alternative.

So the demise of the euro, as a proxy for the EU itself, is not on. Neither is a consolidation on the German federal model. A big push for more Europe is not in the cards now. The loss of that much national sovereignty is unrealistic, given the immature development of a European identity. That is why convergence of fiscal and economic policies is the most likely outcome, not complete structural reform.

But convergence will not save the euro if member states refuse to comply with agreed guidelines. Both France and Germany violated the guidelines in 2003, breaking through the barriers of 3 percent budget deficits and 60 percent debt for more than a year. If the founding members of the eurozone fail to comply or to remedy violations within prescribed time periods, then the euro will well and truly collapse. In a union of sovereign powers, political will is the ultimate arbiter.

Mark S. Sheetz is an Associate in the International Security Program at the John F. Kennedy School of Government of Harvard University. He is currently writing a book on France, Germany, and the Transformation of Europe.  

Over at the Belfer Center's "Power and Policy" blog (a relatively new website which is well worth perusing), my colleague Dick Rosecrance has taken issue with my earlier post on Europe, the European Union, and transatlantic relations. Dick is a friend, a highly accomplished scholar, and a great asset to the Kennedy School. His challenge to my analysis is therefore welcome, though I didn't find it convincing.

For starters, Dick begins his sally by misrepresenting my position. Contrary to what he writes, I did not "consign the European Union to the trashheap of history." Indeed, I made it clear that I expected the European Union to remain intact for some time to come. My point was simply that the high points of European influence, EU unity, and transatlantic security cooperation were now behind us, and that U.S. policymakers ought to take these developments into account. I might add that I think U.S.-European relations will be more harmonious if both sides of the Atlantic have more realistic expectations about each other, instead of acting as if we are still in the heyday of the Cold War. And no, I don't think recent events in Libya are going to alter this trajectory.

Dick makes three main assertions in the rest of his response. First, he reminds us that Europe is the largest economic unit on earth, with a combined GDP that is larger than the United States.  Its power would be even more impressive, he suggests, if it imitated the early American republic and became politically united. This is undeniably true in theory, just as I would be Wimbledon champ if I could play tennis better than Nadal, Federer, or Djokovic. The problem is that Europe isn't like the early American republic, and a true "United States of Europe" is not going to happen in our lifetimes.

Second, he says that "in today's world, economics largely determines politics." Dick is hardly the only person who believes this, but has he noticed all the ways that politics -- pure and simple -- keeps intruding into economic affairs? Were it not for politics, managing Europe's debt crisis would be relatively simple. Absent politics, we would have had better financial regulation here in the United States and we wouldn't have had that 11th hour melodrama over raising the U.S. debt ceiling. If politics were as irrelevant as he suggests, it wouldn't have been seventeen years since the last successful multilateral trade agreement and the Doha Round would not have been a bust. If the desire for economic efficiency and wealth consistently trumped politics, most of the conflicts that still trouble us would have been resolved long ago.

Third, Dick argues that the United States is going to need Europe to counterbalance a rising China. Note the contradiction here: after telling us that economics dominates politics, he proceeds to justify a grand strategic partnership on pure balance-of-power considerations. If economics were all that mattered, we could just spend our time worrying about global trade and investment and there'd be no need to think about China's relative power at all.

Equally important, there is no reason to think that Europe is going to get into the business of balancing China in a serious way. The separate European nations have few strategic interests in Asia and hardly any capacity to project power there. They are far more likely to see China as a market. If the United States were to go to its NATO allies in 2020 and ask for help preserving maritime access in the South China Sea, it would probably get Gallic shrugs of indifference, pious statements of German pacifism, and elegant expressions of English equivocation, and then the diplomats and trade reps would hop the next flight to Beijing. What the United States won't get is any serious help from Europe.

States balance against threats, and one key component of threat is geographic proximity. If the United States decides to balance China--based on the long-range desire to remain the world's only regional hegemon -- and if it needs allies to help it accomplish that task, the place to find them is Asia, not Europe.

In an obvious example of "mission creep," France, Britain, and now Italy have decided to send military advisors to support the rebel army in Libya. While resolutely declaring the no ground troops will be sent, these NATO powers (and the United States), continue to move beyond the original limited purpose of the intervention and are openly seeking to unseat the Qadhafi regime completely.

This situation is a textbook illustration of what one might call the Intervention Paradox. Because there are no vital strategic interests at stake in the Libyan situation, outside leaders are reluctant to do whatever it takes to resolve the situation quickly. You don't hear Obama, Sarkozy, or Cameron declaring that they are going to call up reserves, redeploy forces from other commitments, or launch a direct invasion of Libya itself. They know that that mission isn't worth it, and that their own populations would quickly question the wisdom of such a massive operation.

Instead, intervening powers try to use as little force as possible, and seek to minimize their own casualties above all. After all, when there are no vital interests at stake, it is much harder to justify the loss of one's own soldiers. So they rely on airpower, not boots on the ground.  They'll send advisors and weapons, but not their own troops. But because the rebel army is a ramshackle operation, and because there are real limits to what NATO can achieve with airpower alone, this minimalist approach is more likely to produce a costly stalemate in which more Libyans die. Even if it eventually succeeds, going in small prolongs the fighting and does more damage to the people we are supposedly helping.

The other option, of course, is to use overwhelming force from the very beginning. Qaddafi's loyal forces might be effective against a poorly-trained rebel army, but they would be no match for a sizeable NATO force. But this isn't really the answer either, even if we had such forces readily available (and remember, the United States is already bogged down in other places). For one thing, doing it this way is a lot more expensive, and you're likely to lose some of your own people along the way. And once you've ousted the regime you own the country, and trying to put a society like Libya back together again would not be easy or cheap (see under: Iraq, Afghanistan). Given the divisions that are already apparent among the rebels themselves, and the absence of well-functioning social and political institutions, a post-Qaddafi Libya is likely to be a real headache. And there's always the risk that an insurgency will spring up, further inflating the costs.

Hence the paradox: if you go in light you get a protracted stalemate; if you go in big you end up with a costly quagmire. Under these circumstances you can understand why the intervening powers are tiptoeing their way in, but as noted above, that merely increases the danger that the civil war drags on.

There is a third option, however: great powers could be a lot more careful about where and when they used military power to try to determine who gets to run some foreign country. But that's an option that U.S. leaders seem to have forgotten.

It's not as though the world came to a halt while the Egyptian drama was keeping us glued to our laptops, and at least one interesting development is worth watching closely for a number of reasons. You all know that the EU has been facing a major crisis over the past several years, triggered by deep economic problems in Greece, and to a slightly lesser extent in Spain and Portugal. These troubles forced the eurozone countries to authorize a major financial rescue package last year and led some observers to question whether the euro itself might be at risk.

Over the past few months, however, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy have been negotiating a joint proposal for deepening economic coordination within the EU (and especially the eurozone) in an attempt to solve some of the problems that produced the crisis in the first place. (The basic issue is that the eurozone countries share a currency, but do not have fully integrated tax systems, labor markets, or fiscal systems, thereby making it much harder for them to adjust when one economy gets into trouble). 

Not only does this question have obvious implications for politics and economics in Europe itself, but it also raises some fundamental questions about IR theory and might even be a revealing test of "realist" vs. "liberal" perspectives on international relations more generally. Realists, most notably Sebastian Rosato of Notre Dame, have been bearish about the EU and the euro since the financial crisis, arguing that European member states were more likely to pursue their individual national interests and to begin to step back from some of the integrative measures that the EU had adopted in recent years. 

By contrast, institutionalists, and EU-philes more generally, have suggested that the only way forward was to deepen political integration within Europe. The basic idea here is that economic integration is central to European economic health and one of the keys to continued amity within Europe. Equally important, any attempt to leave the eurozone or to dismantle the euro itself would cause an immediate collapse of the currency (and plunge several European states into even deeper crisis). In this view, there's no going back; Europe can only plunge ahead toward closer integration.   

As you'd expect, I've tended to be among the bears, in part because I don't think greater "policy coordination" between the member states can eliminate occasional fiscal crises and because I think nationalism remains a powerful social force in Europe. European publics won't be willing to keep bailing out insolvent members of the eurozone, and the integrative measures that have been proposed won't be sufficient to eliminate the need. The original Merkel-Sarkozy proposals got a pretty hostile reception when they were rolled out, and Merkel's hopes of pushing them through probably declined when her designated choice to head the European Central Bank (Axel Weber) withdrew from consideration. So it remains to be seen how much of their program will actually get adopted.

But the EU has surprised doomsayers before, and I can't quite convince myself that a collapse of the eurozone is inevitable. So what we have here is a nice test of two rival paradigms, and students of international politics should pay close attention to how this all plays out. But remember: Like all social science theories, no general theory of international politics or foreign policy is right 100 percent of the time. Accordingly, the future evolution of the EU/eurozone won't provide a decisive test that will validate one approach completely and render the other view totally irrelevant and obsolete. Proponents of each perspective will probably try to claim total victory if events turn their way, but that's not really the way that social science operates.

I'm just back from a quick lecture trip in Paris, and offer here a few quick and unscientific observations.

 1. You know all those clichés about how unfriendly Parisians are to Americans? In my experience, totally false. I had a nasty encounter with an ill-tempered concierge in a cheap hotel in 1976, and that's it. Virtually everyone I've ever dealt with there has been friendly and welcoming, and even tolerant of my French, which I daresay is tres imparfait. 

2. Contrary to modern mythology, not all Parisians are thin.

3. They may have banned smoking in Parisian bistros, but plenty of people still smoke.  Not as many as Greece, but more than the United States. 

4. There are lots of bicyclists in Paris.  As a confirmed bike commuter myself, I can only applaud. I didn't see a single one wearing a helmet. Pourquoi?

5.  As I've noted before, Europe is far more multi-ethnic and multi-cultural than it was when I first visited, a trend especially evident in Paris.  It leads to certain incongruous moments, to say the least. On the Metro one evening, an older man entered the car with an accordion and began serenading the passengers (almost all of whom were non-white) with traditional French songs (think Aznavour or Piaf). The passengers sat there stone-faced and completely unresponsive, and I didn't see him earn any tips. Weird.

6. Lastly, a culinary puzzle I've pondered before: Why is that you can go into just about any modest establishment in any city or town or village in France and be assured of finding wonderful bread? Similarly, you can go into any non-descript café in a tiny Italian village and get an espresso that Starbucks would kill to duplicate. Or wander into any anonymous pizza joint in Manhattan and you can get a slice of thin-crust pizza that is ineffably superior to versions of the same thing found elsewhere.  

The point is not that the foods themselves are unique; globalization has spread falafel, sushi, pad thai, rogan josh, borscht, and countless other foods to many corners of the world.  (Although, as a fan of the perenakan (Straits Chinese) cuisine of Singapore, I keep waiting for someone to open a perenakan restaurant here in Boston). Instead, the puzzle is why the imitations tend to be inferior to the originals, unless you are dealing with very high-end purveyors. It's not like making a decent baguette or a good thin-crust pizza is a classified secret like stealth technology. Is this simply because consumers of the globalized imitation have lower standards (i.e., they're just happy to have such foods available, even if they're not made particularly well), or is it because some foods require specialized techniques and local ingredients (i.e., the right kind of flour or water) that aren't as widely available or as easily duplicated as we think? 

I’m in Paris to give a lecture on Obama’s foreign policy after one year, and I can report that 1) it’s cold, 2) it’s beautiful, and 3) there’s some disappointment with Obama’s (lack of) foreign-policy achievements over here.  I base that last conclusion on the conversation at a dinner I attended last night, which included a number of diplomats and foreign policy experts.  The sample size is minuscule and there’s probably selection effects at work, so take that inference with a few grains of salt.

Meanwhile, I see from the International Herald Tribune that we’re having one of those silly discussions about whether a Democratic president -- in this case, Obama -- is “tough” enough to handle the job.   Helene Cooper points out the Democrats have faced this line of criticism ever since Kennedy, and she quotes a bunch of the usual suspects who opine about Obama’s need to do something nasty to someone to show how “tough” he really is.

My question is: what exactly do we mean by “tough”?  If the point is that Obama needs to show that adversaries (including opponents at home) will pay a price for trying to thwart him, then I get that. Being too eager to compromise and too reluctant to hit back just encourages opponents to dig in their heels, and makes it harder to achieve your objectives over time.

But in most of these discussions, “toughness” is either conceived as purely rhetorical posturing (i.e., like whether he's using the phrase “war on terror”), or it is simply equated with more hawkish policies.  In particular, “toughness” is increasingly seen as demonstrating a willingness to use force: a president shows he’s “tough” when he’s willing to order Americans to kill other people.  Ideally, you want to be going after obvious bad guys, but if it’s all about image, then doing anything that involves explosions may be good enough.

Of course, on this score Obama should be in no danger: he’s increased the number of drone strikes against suspected terrorists, escalated the war in Afghanistan, and pushed Pakistan to launch offensives against Islamic extremists on its own soil.  As the Fabulous Thunderbirds (the blues group, not the Air Force exhibition flying group) once sang, “Ain’t That Tough Enough?”

I think this is also a pretty silly way to define “toughness.”  A better definition would be to show resolution in the face of adversity, to persist in the right course of action even in the face of obstacles.  Those obstacles, by the way, would include critics from the GOP or Fox News, as well as the inevitable setbacks that accompany any ambitious policy initiative.

And then there’s the question of whether one is showing resolution in defense of smart policies, or just stubbornly refusing to admit that one’s original decision was wrong.  George W. Bush liked to portray his leadership style as “decisive,” and “determined” and “tough;” the problem was that he clung donkey-like to a lot of boneheaded decisions.  By contrast, the much-maligned Jimmy Carter -- to whom Obama is now being invidiously compared -- was tough and stubborn in pushing for an Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty, and his resolution in the face of many obstacles played a key role in bringing it about.

The point is that you can be tough without being hawkish, and that’s usually preferable to the mindless militarism that most politicians adopt to show their faux “toughness.” And that’s why it’s much more important that a president be smart and strategic and able to identify the right policy choices, and not worry very much about whether he’s being sufficient “tough” to satisfy his critics.  And if Obama tries to base his foreign policy on proving to the GOP he meets their definition of "tough," he'll end up exactly where the GOP's former standard-bearer did.

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