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… read about water politics along the Rio Grande.

Rio Grande tributaries in Mexico, like the Rio Conchos and Rio Salado, flow north and north-east into the river, and by treaty, Mexico is obligated to provide 1.75 million acre-feet of water every five years from those tributaries into the river and, through that, into the farm fields of the United States. Mexico used reserves to meet its obligations for the last five year cycle, but as Dina Arévalo at The Monitor reports [[link removed]], Mexico is far behind on its obligations for the present cycle. Expected tropical storms, which can fill reserves, did not materialize, partially explaining the shortfall. But the bigger question is how the two countries will manage the river and its water as a shared resource, especially as climate change exacerbates environmental uncertainty. Some of this can be fixed with better engineering: In order to meet 77,000 acre-feet of water in Matamoros, 255,000 acre-feet of water must be released upstream because, Arévalo writes, “an ice cube melting in the heat, that extra 178,000 acre-feet of water becomes “conveyance loss” as it travels more than 130 miles downstream.” Engineering can only go so far. For the rest of the water obligation, a political solution will need to be reached.

Conservation Insurgency

In February, Islamist militants in the Sahel used roadside bombs in a complex attack to kill park rangers at Benin’s W National Park. It’s an attack far too deliberate to be senseless violence, and it strikes at a fault line between insurgents and foreign-backed conservation efforts.

In neighboring Burkina Faso, writes Ashoka Mukpo [[link removed]], “state forestry officials were among the first targets of militants looking to establish a foothold in the region, both to eliminate prying eyes and to capitalize on local resentment over regulations that prevent hunting and cattle grazing inside the parks.”

A change in funding for the parks came with a more militaristic approach to conserving wildlife against locals, rather than integrated with them, created a fresh resentment for insurgents to exploit.

FORWARD TO A FRIEND [[link removed]] If You Build It

Drawing on the legacy of land nationalization and its growing demographic needs, Ethiopia is building urban housing at a steady clip to properly house new arrivals to its capital of Addis Ababa, pulling them from shanty towns into proper apartments.

“Ethiopia’s model of direct investment, subsidies, and small-scale public-private partnerships departs from how most nations have pursued large-scale housing development,” write Naomi Zewde and Vivian Schwab [[link removed]].

The project is a massive social transformation, and because housing is awarded by lottery and subsidy, it can break social bonds developed organically from life in a found community on the outskirts of the city.

FORWARD TO A FRIEND [[link removed]] DEEP DIVE Managing the Aftermath: Part I

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is, in the dry parlance of defense planners, an instance of a major power attacking a medium power. The war continues to grind on, with Ukraine’s military resilient and Russia’s struggling more than expected, and unfolding as every war does into a major humanitarian crisis. As the military complexes of the United States, China, and Russia look for battlefield lessons from Russia’s military adventure, authors Brittany Card, Rob Grace, and Tarana Sable argue that humanitarian policymakers and practitioners [[link removed]] need to start adapting now to handle wars on the scale expected in the future.

The modern complex of humanitarian organizations are largely a post-war creation, adapted from constituent parts and built in the wake of World War II into what exists today. What Card et. al. suggest is that the humanitarian enterprise is in a kind of prewar space too. The wars fought since 1945 have been horrific, and many 21st century wars exceeded the scale of violence of high profile conflicts like Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but even with those caveats, nothing in living memory has matched or exceeded the challenges of humanitarian provision in a world war.

One major hurdle expected is that, increasingly, more of the population of the world lives in cities. As sieges from Aleppo to Mariupol have shown, urban terrain confers some immediate tactical advantage to defenders, and it also encourages besieging powers to devastate the urban environment. Humanitarian corridors can let some civilians trade the peril of life under siege for the peril of life as a refugee, but even access to humanitarian corridors may be impossible to get if the besieging power refuses to allow it.

One research participant told the study that “Humanitarian access ‘would indeed be extremely challenging, especially from a UN-related humanitarian response, because it is intrinsically tied to Member State interests, to Member State political will, and the bodies that go along with it. How the UN system is set up is that a certain group of Member States have a large say on how things happen.’”

Indeed, the exact structure of the UN, built to secure the post-war peace, could be the hinge around which another world war breaks. Another participant told the study that a “large-scale conflict between P5 Security Council Member States ‘is an existential threat to the order of what has governed humanitarianism. It’s a major collapse of the foundations we take for granted.’”

The present balance of humanitarian provision to victims of war hinges on agreement or at least acquiescence of great powers to such acts of mercy. What can be done in the event that acquiescence is lacking?

One suggestion is to ensure that militaries plan for humanitarian relief at the same time that they plan for war. Another avenue to explore is preparing for relief work with analog tools, like paper maps and radio-to-radio connections, in case global communications are destroyed or disrupted in a major war. Whatever form the planning might take, the authors argue that for relief work to continue in the event of a world-shaking war, the people responsible for delivering relief should prepare advance plans to ensure that at least some comfort gets through to those in need.

LEARN MORE [[link removed]]

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Manuel Rueda explored [[link removed]] the green potential of rhinoceros beetle poop fertilizer in Colombia. Tierra Viva has been in the business for 15 years, placing beetle larvae on compost for four months until they leave a pile of frass, or beetle manure. “This place used to be a grazing field for cows,” German Viasus told Rueda amidst a small forest Viasus planted with the frass. The manure lacks the intense results of chemical fertilizer, though plants grown with it appear to do better than plants without any fertilizer. And unlike the carbon intensive process of making chemical fertilizers, the main byproduct of frass production is adult rhinoceros beetles, which can be sold to collectors.

Heather Barr spoke to [[link removed]] the gulf between words and actions in nations with self-expressed “feminist foreign policies” when it comes to the plight of women and girls in Afghanistan. Barr noted that Canada, France, Germany, and Sweden all deployed soldiers to Afghanistan in 2011, and many linked their role in the war to the aim of promoting women’s rights and safety. Underscoring the paucity between such wartime aims and an obligation to aim in the aftermath, Barr asked the countries to explicitly coordinate international pressure on the Taliban to ensure it does more for women and girls.

Durrie Bouscaren reported [[link removed]] on the discomfort of Romanian villagers who live near a NATO missile system. The Aegis Ashore, adapted from a ship-based sensor system, looks like the deckhouse of a ship stuck into a field, and it exists to shoot missile interceptors ostensibly at Iranian missiles flying over the country. But the installation, along with others in the country and in Poland, have been named by Putin as a threat to Russia directly. Romania has already absorbed refugees from Ukraine, and people living near the missile worry that Russian fear of the site has put a crosshair on their backs.

FORWARD TO A FRIEND [[link removed]] WELL PLAYED

Can I get a “woop woop” for the ancient scythians [[link removed]]?

What matters in negotiations is the power we give words, not the actual words [[link removed]].

When you stare into the meme, the meme stares back [[link removed]].

Kim Jong-un bringing millennial sensibilities [[link removed]] to nuclear arsenals.

It remains impossible to overstate how loony the early aughts were [[link removed]].

Satire [[link removed]] becomes reality [[link removed]] so fast these days.

Geopolitics is just tumblrweeds [[link removed]] in the wind.

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Critical State is written by Sam Ratner with Inkstick Media.

The World is a weekday public radio show and podcast on global issues, news and insights from PRX and GBH.

With an online magazine and podcast featuring a diversity of expert voices, Inkstick Media is “foreign policy for the rest of us.”

Critical State is made possible in part by the Carnegie Corporation of New York.

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