Are there really any "...world leaders who have no other diplomatic channel to speak to one another..." besides Twitter?

Question

At about 03:58 in NBC News' New Wave Of Resignations Hit Twitter After Musk's Ultimatum For Employees, NBC technology correspondent Jake Ward says the following about current events in Twitter and their impact:

What we're also seeing however is a big shift from what was really an article of faith when working at Twitter. You were there as part of a piece of important civic infrastructure. You were trying to keep people together.

We're talking about the instrument with which world leaders who have no other diplomatic channel to speak to one another get the word out to one another across Twitter.

It is an extraordinary channel in terms of what it does, and it is largely unique in this landscape at this moment.

Question: Is this a bit of journalistic license, or are there really "...world leaders who have no other diplomatic channel to speak to one another..." and their only options to signal to each other is by "...get(ting) the word out to one another across Twitter"?

Are there at least notable specific cases of countries without diplomatic relations where they have telegraphed positions, postures or information to one another via tweets?

I'm going to suggest we stay with Ward's use of present tense when discussing the use of Twitter now (or in the future) and avoid some previous, notable deviations from international norms.

Answer 1

Are there at least notable specific cases of countries without diplomatic relations where they have telegraphed positions, postures or information to one another via tweets?

Is this really a question that is being asked after the Trump era? Much of his more public dealings with North Korea were put out through Twitter (including Trump informing Kim Jong-Un that "my button [to launch nuclear weapons] works" and responding to a speech where Kim called Trump "old" as rude and vowing that he [Trump] would never call Kim "fat".

That said, methods for cultivating diplomatic back door channels have existed for centuries compared to Twitter's 16 years of existence. The peaceful resolution of the Cuban Missile Crisis was largely handled through backdoor channels between the U.S. and U.S.S.R. The famous meeting between Trump and Kim at the 38th Parallel was in all likelihood co-ordinated through channels that were a bit more sophisticated than Twitter's DMs (likely involving the Swedish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, as Sweden represents the U.S.'s interests in North Korea.).

Answer 2

"How satisfied are you with your long-distance service?"

International phone calls and telegraph have been a thing for a century. They are still a thing. Countries have embassies - almost everyone has an embassy to almost everyone.

Presidents have official phone numbers. The president of the US can be reached at +1 202-456-1111. The president of Russia at +7 495-625-3-81. The president of China at +86 10-6307-0913.

Sure, they probably won't put you on the direct line, but for the right person, the switchboards go to whomever you need.

Social networks are media. They offer a way to get published instantly and be seen around the world. It's like an instant newspaper that everyone can read.

Answer 3

The only way I can see this as not a nonsense, the ad hoc conversations between business leaders like Elon Musk and political leaders like Volodymyr Zelenskyy do happen as seen in this tweet.

Official diplomatic relations between countries obviously have lots of other established channels since the times there was no electricity invented yet (visits, letters), leave alone computers, internet and Tweeter.

Answer 4

world leaders who have no other diplomatic channel to speak to one another

This looks like, a lot of, artistic license. You need to look at the larger context.

• NBC is fairly left-aligned. Twitter coverage looks very different seen from Fox.

• Trump was previously banned from Twitter

• Musk, who sometimes has this Trump bromance going on, buys Twitter. In fact, he has reinstated Trump.

• Musk has bought somewhat of a dumpster fire of a platform, tech-wise * and, with his trademark careful and compassionate approach to management is "changing things". Whether "changing things" will result in a Twitter that finally manages to monetize its unique media position or a dead Twitter is entirely up in the air. (I'd bet on the 2nd case right now - esp. with advertisers pausing purchases)

As previous answers have said better, Twitter, is not, and should not really be, an essential part of world diplomacy. As an exhibit of a lack of inherent suitability, I'd suggest looking at 4 years of Trump Tweets. But from a Democratic point of view having the possibility of rampant xenophobic and obnoxious crap escape moderation once again is problematic. And coverage will therefore be critical.

* from memory, here are some of things these IT security experts were saying about Twitter:

• who has access to what data is very badly controlled - this means for example dissidents can get doxxed to foreign governments

• there are concerns that under some conditions a hard Twitter site crash may not be recoverable from. at all.

• developers "code to production" in many cases, rather than having test environments.

• if a message gets deleted, is it really deleted? No one is quite sure, due to crappy data governance.

See also NPR's coverage of the Senate hearings. Sure, Musk has triggered a crisis. But many of its ingredients predated him.

Answer 5

Depends upon what you mean by channel…obviously the leader of any country has the resources to at least attempt communicating with any other.

What they might not have is the political power to actually make that happen, or can’t afford the political capital of making an explicit connection.

Twitter can be used as a somewhat denialable avenue of communication — as long as names aren’t mentioned, something like policy statements can be made without them being actually policy.

So, yes, a channel unlike any other. Now, how necessary that is, or how frequently it was used that way, is another question.

Answer 6

Yes they have other channels (even covert ones)...

However, the point of a public statement or question:

1.) is to make it a matter of public record (cant be hidden) or to invite public discourse. Such a method is useful if your opposition is unlikely to be swayed by reason, or courtesy, because politicians are often most swayed by [population vs opinion]

(or "popular opinion")

1b.) So politicians do this when they are certain they

i. [believe/bet on enough people are on their side], and the smart ones think that the

ii.[opposition does not have such an advantage]*

*(however that could just be them not contemplating that popuation. Those are idealogues)

Answer 7

Is this a bit of journalistic license?

The statement literally means "Twitter is the only way for world leaders to communicate with one another using Twitter," so it's true but fairly meaningless. If you read between the lines and determine that the speaker probably meant to say "Twitter is the only channel for diplomatic communication available to some leaders" then no, it's utter nonsense. Diplomatic communication is generally conducted in private, not in public.

Are there at least notable specific cases of countries without diplomatic relations where they have telegraphed positions, postures or information to one another via tweets?

There may be, but this is a very different question. Public statements are not "a diplomatic channel of communication," and the fact that someone may have made such statements via Twitter does not imply that Twitter was the only "instrument" for making such statements.

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In response to a comment from uhoh,

"The statement literally means 'Twitter is the only way for world leaders...'" No it literally says something different than that. I have it in bold font there and I'll do that here as well: " ...who have no other diplomatic channel to speak to one another get the word out to one another..." We don't need even more manufactured outrage here. Also, can you support why public statements can never be a diplomatic channel of communication or adjust your last sentence so that it's not so absolute?

Ok, yes, it is perhaps imprecise of me to paraphrase something while using the phrase "literally says." It literally says "We're talking about the instrument with which world leaders who have no other diplomatic channel to speak to one another get the word out to one another across Twitter." But "world leaders who have no other diplomatic channel to speak to one another" is only a subset of people for whom Twitter is "the instrument with [they] get the word out to one another across Twitter." The full set of such people is all Twitter users. Twitter is the the only instrument with which anyone can "get the word out across Twitter" just as NBC News is the only instrument with which anyone can get the word out through NBC News. It is a true statement of trivial utility.

Now of course the phrase "using Twitter" at the end of the statement can be written off to the imprecision that often arises in speech. Discounting that phrase makes the statement somewhat more meaningful, which is why I also note that the set of "world leaders who have no other diplomatic channel to speak to one another" is the empty set, because everyone has access to telephone and e-mail, and world leaders furthermore have access to diplomatic intermediaries from other countries with mutual diplomatic relations, whether with formal recognition as a protecting power or otherwise.

As to the last sentence, public statements are a public channel of communication. Such statements are of course a significant element in diplomacy, but they are not a diplomatic channel of communication. The phrase "diplomatic channel" typically refers to official communication through diplomats. See, for example:

• https://dictionary.translegal.com/en/diplomatic-channels/noun
• https://glosbe.com/en/en/diplomatic%20channels