Domestic policy and foreign policy form a dialectical unity. They are always in tension, they always condition each other. A country with a complicated internal situation may be more vulnerable to the great shocks of international politics. A country with strong internal consensus can navigate better abroad, but it will not be completely safe from the sudden movement of the oceans. Dense internal brawls usually summon the most aggressive external forces. The Spain of 2024 could become an example of this.
2024 will be a hard, brave, perhaps wild year. A year of ballot boxes and weapons. This is how Cidob, the prestigious international study center based in Barcelona, has summarized it. A year of polls, since it is estimated that half of the world's population will be called to vote in more than 70 countries. (The European Union will renew its Parliament, there will be presidential elections in the United States and Russia, in Mexico and Indonesia, in Algeria and Venezuela; legislative elections in Portugal and perhaps in the United Kingdom, in Pakistan, in Taiwan, it is even planned that vote in Ukraine, in the middle of the fighting...). A year of weapons. Russia, again on the offensive in Ukraine. Gaza, one step away from the great regional conflict in the Middle East, until now avoided by the United States and Iran. Instability in French-speaking Africa and many other conflicts that could heat up as a result of worsening international tensions. The arms trade is going from strength to strength.
The closest example of the correlation between foreign policy and domestic policy is found these days in the Red Sea, whose naval routes may be strangled as a direct consequence of the war in Gaza. The combative Shiite faction of Yemen, guided and armed by Iran, has begun to attack merchant ships in the Bab el Mandeb Strait, which connects the Red Sea with the Indian Ocean. Their primary target would be ships bound for or originating in the port of Eliat, the only Israeli port on the Red Sea, but the world's main shipping companies, frightened, have instructed their captains to take the Cape of Good Hope route. , longer and more expensive. They do not want scares and fear the increase in insurance prices.
Sea freight rates between Europe and Asia have already increased by 16%. If this situation were to continue, it would not take long for a new rise in inflation to occur on an international scale. The United States, which is already escorting ships in the Red Sea, has convened an international coalition to maintain freedom of passage in Bab el Mandeb and share efforts. Spain has been summoned.
Days before Christmas, and correcting his Ministers of Defense and Foreign Affairs, the President of the Government made the decision to distance Spain from any military deployment in the Red Sea in the coming months. First, direct participation in the operation announced by the United States, baptized as Guardians of Prosperity, was rejected, and then the Atalanta operation against piracy in the Gulf of Aden (antechamber to Bab el Mandeb), in force since in 2009 and currently under Spanish military command, collaborated with the mission promoted by the United States. Josep Borrell, high representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, publicly defended the Atalanta option, with the silent support of the Spanish ministries of Defense and Foreign Affairs. Pedro Sánchez ordered the stop on December 21, and the next day he received a call from Joe Biden, whose official reason was to congratulate him on the recent inauguration. After these lurches, the last known Spanish position is to propose the launch of a specific European mission for the Red Sea, in which it would possibly not participate. Everything will depend on what happens in January.
The United States will soon announce the countries that support its coalition. The European Union must opt for its own mission or invite them to join the North American military deployment. Based on these decisions, shipping companies will have to decide whether to resume the Suez and Red Sea route, or continue diverting towards the Cape of Good Hope, despite the increase in costs. Iran will also have to decide whether to push Yemen's Houthi militias into further escalation. One of the main trade routes in the world is at stake, and Spain is not the only country that doubts, since Bab el Mandeb could become a scene of war. Senior Spanish military commanders have quietly expressed their perplexity at the situation created (see La Vanguardia on December 27), since a resounding refusal to intervene could affect the reputation and position of the Spanish armed forces in NATO.
After the course correction over Morocco and Western Sahara in March 2022, a turn that was carried out in coordination with the Secretary of State of the United States Government, it is the first time that President Sánchez has come into tension with Washington. It is not a minor issue, although it has been somewhat overshadowed by the Christmas holidays. In January, the Red Sea will reappear, and it is not certain that its waters will open to give way to harmony.
Domestic policy and foreign policy. Sánchez did not want to reach the end of the year with the news of Spain's imminent participation in a war scenario, after having requested a permanent ceasefire in Gaza, with strong criticism of the immense bloodbath caused by the Government of Israel in retaliation for the savage Hamas attack of October 7. Sánchez's words in Israel in favor of a ceasefire in November did not provoke the anger of the United States and were liked by various European governments that, for various reasons, could not express themselves publicly in the same terms. At that time, former president José María Aznar, very well connected with the Likud for more than twenty years, predicted that Israel would harshly punish Spain for taking a position. “Spain will pay dearly for this blunder,” he said.
Foreign policy and domestic policy. Sánchez did not want to start 2024 with the narrative framework of an imminent war action in the Red Sea, after having requested a permanent ceasefire in Gaza. There are regional elections in Galicia on February 18 and the PSOE aspires to remove the absolute majority from the Popular Party, with the consequent loss for Alberto Núñez Feijóo if this were to happen. It will not be easy for this circumstance to occur if we take into account the strength of the PP in Galicia and the resounding fragmentation of the Galician left's candidacies. In January, the PSOE will hold a political conference in A Coruña, and Sánchez does not want to arrive at that programmatic conclave with a Spanish destroyer patrolling the Red Sea. Perhaps I arrived at February 18 with a serious increase in shipping costs and a breach in the relationship with the State Department. The elegant prints from the closing of the NATO summit at the Prado Museum in June 2022 could turn yellow. Foreign policy and domestic policy sometimes form a devilish dialectical unity.
The results in Galicia will influence in some way the Basque spring elections (the date has not yet been set), paving the way towards the European elections on June 9 in which foreign policy and domestic policy will face each other very closely. Serious. And then will come the United States presidential elections in which the course of the world may change again.
Spanish politics has gained complexity and elasticity after the July 23 elections. So much so that the Popular Party itself has requested the "mediation" of the European Commission to unblock the renewal of the General Council of the Judiciary (CGPJ), paralyzed for five years. Domestic policy and foreign policy. "International mediation" has become one of the new formats of Spanish politics. The limits of this elasticity will be given by the waves of the world.
