3
3
3
Obama has shifted the US military's focus from the Middle East to Asia in an attempt to 'contain' China [GALLO/GETTY]
Let's celebrate the end of an eventful 2011 with a fable.
Once
upon a time in the young 21st century, the eagle, the bear and the
dragon took their (furry) gloves off and engaged in a New Cold War.
When
the original Cold War ended -- in theory -- in late 1991, in a dacha in
Belarus, with the bear almost in coma, the eagle assumed the bear's
right to an independent foreign policy which was also cancelled.
That
was more than clear between 1999 and 2004 -- when NATO, against all
promises made to former top bear Gorbachev, expanded all the way to
Eastern Europe and the Baltic states.
So the bear started wondering; what if in the end they take away all my security space and I'm geopolitically starved?
In the young 21st century, the key tug-of-war between the eagle and
the bear concerns missile defence. Not even the eagle itself knows
whether this immensely expensive gimmick will work. And even if it does,
it will probably be financed by a reluctant dragon, which holds over US
$1.5tn in eagle debt.
The bear has repeatedly argued the
deployment of interceptor missiles and radars in that land of the blind
leading the blind -- Europe -- is a threat. The eagle says no, don't worry
-- this is to protect us from those rogue Persians.
Yet the bear is not convinced. So, in a global TV message
with English subtitles, the bear announced it has already deployed to
the Baltic Sea exclave of Kaliningrad a new early warning system to
monitor missiles launched either from Europe or the North Atlantic. And
the Iskander missile system may follow.
The bear is frustrated. It says it has repeatedly offered to
co-operate with the eagle and its minions for the development of a joint
system -- to no avail. The bear insists the door remains open for a
compromise. They will have to talk again -- after the fractious 2012
presidential campaign in Eagleland. Meanwhile, the dragon wearily
watches.
And the blind shall lead the blind
Roughly
two decades after what top bear Putin defined as "the greatest
geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century," he has proposed a USSR
light -- as in the Eurasian Union, a political/economic body already
subscribed by snow leopard Kazakhstan and Belarus, soon to be joined by
Eurasian cubs Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan.
As for Turkmenistan and
Uzbekistan, they are far too worried about how to balance pressure by
both the eagle and the bear. And then there's the Ukraine; will it
choose the bear or the blind leading the blind?
The eagle
wants something completely different; a New Silk Road under its control.
The eagle seems to forget that the original Silk Road linked the dragon
with the Roman Empire for centuries -- with no interlopers outside of
Eurasia.
The eagle is also literally fuming about the fact that
the top bear for the next six years (and perhaps 12) will be, once
again, Putin. The bear, for its part, is trying to manage for its own
benefit the dragon's inexorable push towards global preeminence.
That's
why the bear is betting on an economic space "from Lisbon to
Vladivostok" -- that is, intimate co-operation with that motley crew in
crisis-hit blind leading the blind. The problem is the blind are, well,
blind, and can't seem to get their act together.
