Strategic Stalking
This link is to the MoD's Global Strategic Trends page, which allows you to download the current issue of that report (and fill in a feedback form if you wish.)
It's about one hundred and sixty pages, although not exactly small print, so it's not a casual read. But it does give some insight into why some groups might want to target and harass other groups in society.
The report predicts both resource wars and ethnic conflicts, although it's pretty clear to Medawar that the main driver of ethnic conflict is when a powerful elite tries either to harness an ethnic group in order to control a natural resource, or to destabilize and perhaps deport or even exterminate an ethnic community in order to remove them from control of resources. This could well be the sort of thing that's behind the organized stalking of native American leaders, journalists and artists that Terri Hansen has reported. It definitely is what's behind the relentless ethnic persecution of non-Burman ethnic groups in Burma, especially as the Karens control some areas of the countryside, despite enormous pressure, and other deceased ethnic groups had a strong presence on geographically-viable trade routes into neighbouring countries. (The extraction route is as important as the resource in many cases, nowhere more so than in Burma. Burma only looks small on the map because it is between India and China: it's a large country with an awful lot of natural barriers in it, so a small tribe living on a navigable river will inevitably become a target for the regime's genocide programmes. Venuzaela's (unfounded) claims to territory in Guyana are motivated as much by the need for routes to extract natural resources as the resources themselves, Guatamala's claims to Belize are entirely so motivated, as Belize has less of everything than Guatamala, save for access to the Caribean and therefore the Atlantic.)
In some cases, parties wanting to exploit resources may attempt to boost the position of an ethnic minority that happens to live in the right region, or is in the process of moving into it. But in the long run, this is as hostile to that community's interests as immediate persecution, because whoever is displaced or disadvantaged by this now has a reason to cooperate with some rival power-broker who wants the favoured ethnic community out of the way.
So, if one political grouping seems very hostile to the Saami people in Northern Scandinavia, for example, and their rivals seem "sympathetic", the attentions of both political groupings are probably unhealthy in the long run.
In any case, a read of the strategic trends document, and it is frequently updated, may help Cornflakers develop the right kind of insight to understand why some really bizarre things are being done, by the authorities or powerful persons unknown, in a number of countries.
The 2007-2036 version of this document was more focused on the risks posed to global stability by very rich individuals than the current draft seems to be, but that's a change of emphasis not a change of fact: that sort of "Goldfinger" oligarch is a real risk, and it's interesting to see that even the MoD recognized that risk, albeit nearly forty years after Ian Fleming and Len Deighton!
Strategic understanding is an essential part of any sort of intelligent activism against genocide and other human rights abuses. Know why, know who, know how, and perhaps you can make an effective case against it all.
It's about one hundred and sixty pages, although not exactly small print, so it's not a casual read. But it does give some insight into why some groups might want to target and harass other groups in society.
The report predicts both resource wars and ethnic conflicts, although it's pretty clear to Medawar that the main driver of ethnic conflict is when a powerful elite tries either to harness an ethnic group in order to control a natural resource, or to destabilize and perhaps deport or even exterminate an ethnic community in order to remove them from control of resources. This could well be the sort of thing that's behind the organized stalking of native American leaders, journalists and artists that Terri Hansen has reported. It definitely is what's behind the relentless ethnic persecution of non-Burman ethnic groups in Burma, especially as the Karens control some areas of the countryside, despite enormous pressure, and other deceased ethnic groups had a strong presence on geographically-viable trade routes into neighbouring countries. (The extraction route is as important as the resource in many cases, nowhere more so than in Burma. Burma only looks small on the map because it is between India and China: it's a large country with an awful lot of natural barriers in it, so a small tribe living on a navigable river will inevitably become a target for the regime's genocide programmes. Venuzaela's (unfounded) claims to territory in Guyana are motivated as much by the need for routes to extract natural resources as the resources themselves, Guatamala's claims to Belize are entirely so motivated, as Belize has less of everything than Guatamala, save for access to the Caribean and therefore the Atlantic.)
In some cases, parties wanting to exploit resources may attempt to boost the position of an ethnic minority that happens to live in the right region, or is in the process of moving into it. But in the long run, this is as hostile to that community's interests as immediate persecution, because whoever is displaced or disadvantaged by this now has a reason to cooperate with some rival power-broker who wants the favoured ethnic community out of the way.
So, if one political grouping seems very hostile to the Saami people in Northern Scandinavia, for example, and their rivals seem "sympathetic", the attentions of both political groupings are probably unhealthy in the long run.
In any case, a read of the strategic trends document, and it is frequently updated, may help Cornflakers develop the right kind of insight to understand why some really bizarre things are being done, by the authorities or powerful persons unknown, in a number of countries.
The 2007-2036 version of this document was more focused on the risks posed to global stability by very rich individuals than the current draft seems to be, but that's a change of emphasis not a change of fact: that sort of "Goldfinger" oligarch is a real risk, and it's interesting to see that even the MoD recognized that risk, albeit nearly forty years after Ian Fleming and Len Deighton!
Strategic understanding is an essential part of any sort of intelligent activism against genocide and other human rights abuses. Know why, know who, know how, and perhaps you can make an effective case against it all.
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