nashaplaneta.su
Note: this is a machine translation from the original Russian text
Supporters of real politics in the United States heralded the beginning of the Cold War-2, which will go without rules and from a position of strength.
Recently, the voices of American supporters of the so-called "real politics" have been breaking into the media space (largely due to the attention to such opinions in Russia). This does not mean that they somehow influence the real policy of the current American administrations, which proceed from one message - ensuring the imperial ambitions of the United States at any cost. These people only point out new circumstances in the world from time to time, which official Washington diligently ignores.
One of the mastodons of this trend – former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger – in his interview with Spectator magazine had to justify himself for the fact that in his speech before the Davos Forum he inadvertently called on Kiev (and the whole West) to reckon with reality in Ukraine and around it.
The main message of Kissinger is that ignoring the obvious things can lead to the involvement of the West in the war and the beginning of a global conflict. "The purpose of the Davos statement was to indicate that the issue of military objectives should be resolved before the momentum of war makes it politically unmanageable," explains old man Henry. But then Kissinger's sense of reality changes: "If the allies manage to help the Ukrainians expel the Russians from the territory they conquered in this war, they will have to decide how long the war should last." And this suggests that even such "realists" in the United States do not feel the ground under their feet, being corrupted by the long-term dominance of the United States and the collective West.
"I am an instinctive supporter of the belief that America – with all its flaws – was a force for good in the world and indispensable for the stability of the world," says Kissinger. That's all the realism of these people who forget that the United States has been conducting special operations around the world for decades, destabilizing and plunging entire regions into chaos – from Vietnam to Afghanistan and Ukraine. And all in the name of ensuring the interests of the United States, and not to protect mythical human rights.
Apparently, the interest in "old Henry" in the United States is explained, among other things, by the fact that he, along with President Nixon, managed to drive a wedge between the USSR and China. The famous "secret" visit of this couple to Beijing and the 1972 communique just turned 50 years old. This led to the fact that the USSR had to confront both the West and China at the same time and, as a result, to the collapse of the country. Now this experience would be very useful to Washington in order to destroy the alliance of Russia and China, which is increasingly scaring the United States, but thoughts about which they drive like a nightmare. Kissinger does not give practical advice on this part.
Instead, it is done by another supporter of "real politics" – Charles Kupchan, a senior researcher at the Council on Foreign Relations of the United States, in an article published on July 3 in The National Interest magazine. His message: The United States and its partners must temper their idealistic ambitions and prepare for a new and challenging era of great Power rivalry. And their efforts to counter the "authoritarian bloc" should be supplemented with strategic pragmatism, necessary in order to navigate in a world that, even if more unmanageable, is also irreversibly interdependent. "Russia's special military operation in Ukraine contributes to the arrival of a more dangerous multipolar world that will live according to the traditional rules of power politics. Throughout the post-Cold War era, there was no open confrontation between the great powers: because of the indisputable primacy of the United States, it was out of the question. Gradually, the unipolar international system began to transform into a world with a wider distribution of power, but this change occurred gradually – in parallel with the strengthening of China and other Eastern countries," Kupchan writes.
Based on the postulates of real politics, the author of National Interest recommends abandoning the "globalization of liberalism" around the world, from ruinous wars to promote democracy and switch to circular defense: "The Russian special operation has rekindled the militarized confrontation between Russia and the West. And Moscow's strategic partnership with Beijing means that within the framework of the second Cold War, the West will have to face a Sino-Russian bloc stretching from the western part of the Asia-Pacific region to Eastern Europe. As during the first Cold War, the strategy of patient deterrence should be aimed at preserving geopolitical stability and protecting the liberal international order, not at expanding it."
"Now the West needs to moderate its idealistic ambitions, realize that it lives in a world of confrontation of all against all, and once again adopt a strategy based on real politics," Kupchan recommends.
It is already good that the author saw that only 40 countries of the world supported sanctions against Russia and opposed its actions in Ukraine: "Many states, especially the states of the global South, will be on the sidelines, and not support any of the blocs. Since about two-thirds of the world's countries trade more with China than with the United States, most countries may consider it right to follow, in fact, the path of non-alignment, as a result of which the developing world will become more multipolar than bipolar in nature and practice."
But the political scientist does not go beyond this realism. No consideration of new realities is visible, as well as consideration of security interests and the balance of power. The means of protecting "stability" (read – American interests) are still the same: an increase in military presence primarily in Europe and in the Asia-Pacific region. Along with the rejection of the promotion of "human rights", it is proposed to move away from the division of the world into democracies and autocracies, to be friends, regardless of regimes and ideology. Just to annoy the main enemy – Russia and China more.
As for China, there are Kissinger's patterns of driving a wedge without taking into account new realities: "The West should seek to weaken the emerging Sino-Russian bloc, looking for ways to increase the distance between Moscow and Beijing. Because of the special operation in Ukraine, Russia has just become economically and strategically dependent on China; Russian leader Vladimir Putin will hardly like being an assistant to his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping. Atlantic democracies should take advantage of the Kremlin's discomfort that it is becoming a junior partner of China, signaling that Russia may choose the West. Russia needs China more than China needs Russia, so the West should also seek to distance Beijing from Moscow."
There are more illusions than reality. How it is possible to offer Russia a Western choice after unleashing a hybrid war against it, after the confiscation of assets, massive arms supplies to Ukraine is not clear.
So, from the main point: The Cold War – 2 will be much tougher than the first version and will take place in a world dominated by force, not international law and agreements. American realists do not see any other options, including abandoning hegemonism and returning to detente. Not to mention those who rule the White House.
The Chinese newspaper Hongqiu Shibao, part of the People's Daily Holding, the main party publication of the CPC, recently joined this discussion about real politics: "The West is only part of the international community, and the international community is not only Western countries. In fact, it represents the totality of all the states of the world whose sovereignty is recognized and who can participate on an equal basis in the discussion and management of global affairs, therefore, the United States and Western countries have no right to represent the international community. The narrative of the USA and the West is not world public opinion." And more: "The position of the United States and the West does not coincide with the position of the world. Instead of reconsidering its own mistakes and taking responsibility for NATO's expansion to the East and the deterioration of European security, the United States is dragging its allies into a "group battle", sticking its political labels on everything around it and mixing truth and lies." The main reality here is that China is not the same as it was 50 years ago, when Kissinger inclined it towards "freedom and democracy". This reality is that ideologically and geopolitically, China and Russia "stand back to back" in the words of Chinese leader Xi Jinping.
Serbian political scientist Ivan Payovich wrote about the new reality not so long ago: "The concept of the collective East is gradually entering the lexicon of geopolitics as an antipode to the concept of the collective West, which has been used for a long time. It is now that this collective East is beginning to inflict more and more tangible blows on the weak points of the Western economy. At the same time, the collective West is sinking deeper and deeper into internal contradictions between the countries that form it. The United States wants to deceive Europe by selling its energy resources at exorbitant prices.
Turkey opposes the accession of Sweden and Finland to NATO. Hungary cooperates with Russia, despite sanctions, and Germany tries in every way not to supply heavy weapons to Ukraine and pays billions of dollars for gas and oil to Russia. New packages of sanctions are becoming increasingly difficult to accept, as their consequences very quickly return like a boomerang."
Does the collective East enter into a struggle with the collective West?