Obama, four cities, and the ‘20-year crisis’
Untimely Thoughts
Peter Lavelle's blog
Obama, four cities, and the ‘20-year crisis’
During his journey through Europe this week, US President Barack Obama will likely have some time on his hands as he travels to four capital cities. I would strongly suggest he read a book that very much needs to come back into vogue – E.H. Carr’s ‘The Twenty Year Crisis’. Instead of learning from history, we are again doomed to repeat it.
Obama is making his debut on the world stage. He will meet his Russian counterpart on the sidelines of the G20 emergency financial summit in London. There is every indication that Obama will be well received because of his ‘star quality’, and the fact he isn’t George W. Bush. This will be the best part of his visit – everything else will be hard and contentious. Europe, like most of the world, has grown tired of American leadership and its hegemonic ideas and practices. This is the essence of another ‘twenty-year crisis’.
In a nutshell, E. H. Carr’s thesis is the following: the post-First World War environment was so badly conceived and implemented that it created an international system in disarray and later led to the Second World War. The Treaty of Versailles was a victors’ peace which punished Germany and ignored what became the Soviet Union. To add insult to injury, the US decided to wash its hands of the new international order that it played a role in creating it. Today we are witnessing a similar crisis – the specifics are different, but the same systemic failures are evident.
In every capital Obama will visit – London, Strasburg, Prague, and Istanbul – the systemic crisis resulting from a fundamental misunderstanding of the meaning and consequences of the Cold War’s end is playing itself out.
The loosening of America’s grip
In London the G20 will meet. The American economic model is on its knees, bringing the world down with it. Obama’s message – that we must spend our way out of the global financial crisis – will be a hard sell, even a no sell. Because the international economic system was designed to serve Western interests, particularly Washington’s, after the Second World War and since the end of the Cold War, expecting the other countries of this group to follow this failed model is more than unlikely.
But Washington has a huge and very unfair advantage – it can print as many dollars as it wants with little risk in the short and medium term. However, other countries, China for example with hundreds of billions of dollars in reserves, are now in a position to remind the US that its patience for irresponsible and selfish fiscal monetary policy will no longer be acceptable. In the 1920s and 1930s countries like Germany and the Soviet Union were treated as pariahs and discriminated against economically.
Today the interests of Russia, China, and the emerging economic giants must be given a fair hearing. When Barack meets Dmitry he will be told as much and, I suspect, much, much more. And the issue of replacing or at least creating an alternative to the greenback as global reserve currency is on the table. This won’t happen in London, but the idea is gaining popularity and it is only a matter of time before this happens.
Democratizing security
In Strasburg Obama will be forced to confront the limits and consequences of America’s imperial reach. It is often said that NATO, established 60 years ago, is at a crossroad. Well, that is the charitable description. The fact is that this political-military alliance is bankrupt in every way. It should have collapsed itself when its mission was over when the Soviet Union voluntarily collapsed in on itself and reached out the hand of friendship to the West. Alas, the West didn’t reciprocate and as a result become one of history’s greatest missed opportunities to secure a meaningful and stable international order. Washington had different plans and followed in the failed steps of the Versailles order.
Today NATO is a club for the snobby and those looking for security on the cheap. Everything was fine when alliance members, especially the new ones from the former Warsaw Pact and the Baltic countries, agreed with Washington when the US taxpayer picked up the bill. But when NATO actually has to do something, it usually ends in a cock-up of one sort or another. NATO’s track record during the collapse of what was Yugoslavia is appalling. The anemic campaign in Afghanistan is still another historic failure. And its constant aggressive and at the same time opaque attitude toward Russia has only fueled Moscow’s perception that NATO is a continued security threat.
NATO expansion since 1991 has been a geopolitical mistake of historic propositions. Originally, NATO (rightfully) faced-off a very real Soviet military threat. And when West Germany joined the alliance in 1955 it was indicative of a new and very important added mission that NATO took on the reconciliation of former enemies. This lesson from the past has been forgotten. Countries such as Poland and the Baltic states use NATO (and EU membership) as a platform to settle historical grievances against the new Russia. Where is the concept of ‘projecting security’ as NATO claims, when the very idea of historical reconciliation has been completely abandoned? Russia has taken note of this.
The idea of expansion continues unabated. In Strasburg, NATO leaders talk the talk of inducting new members, which include the so-called democracies Ukraine and Georgia. I have no doubt Medvedev will ask Obama about the ‘democracy of security’. NATO expansion is in Russia’s backyard and when then things go wrong – and when it comes to NATO it usually does – Moscow is left to pick up the pieces.
The proponents of NATO continue the mistake of the ‘twenty-year crisis’. During the interwar years, alliances in Europe were made that actually created security threats that originally didn’t exist. NATO must halt its policy of expansion for expansion’s sake. NATO should also treat Russia as an equal partner. Together they can achieve much and save the alliance from becoming completely marginalized and a much maligned historic bad joke.
Mittleuropa – the eye of the storm
Obama’s visit to Prague is very appropriate. The different levels of rage and disappointment found in Eastern Europe are a very telling reminder of the ‘twenty-year crisis’. The Versailles settlement created new states in Eastern Europe from three fallen empires and promised to protect them. This did not happen, nor has EU and NATO membership done the same for them. EU membership was supposed to be a panacea toward prosperity and international influence. The exact opposite has happened. The new post-Soviet satellites entered the EU poor and will remain (relatively) poor. The EU claims to be one big democratic family, but at the end of day the big, rich and powerful within the union protect their interests first and foremost.
The US president has an additional headache to deal with – sidelining Prague and Warsaw to improve relations with Russia. There is every indication that Washington will do a major re-think when it comes to anti-missile defense in Eastern Europe. Of course the neocons in Washington and the political elites in Prague and Warsaw will shout the word ‘appeasement’, but the reality is that if Washington and Moscow can achieve a rapprochement then Brussels (NATO and the EU) can rest a little easier. If Washington and Moscow do want better relations, neither will allow European issues to spoil this new agenda. Said differently, if the UK, France and the US had engaged and defeated Germany and the new Soviet Union during the 1920s and very early 1930s the nightmare of aggressive fascism might have been avoided.
Obama and Medvedev should and can get along. However, there are some important caveats. Both should agree that Eastern Europe is no longer a geographical space up for competition. Russia has absolutely no interest in calling the shots in Eastern Europe and the Baltic states. All it wants is respect – nothing more. The Versailles order vacillated when it came to protecting the security interests of Eastern Europe. Sadly, Brussels continues to listen to the outdated and politically unhelpful hatred coming out come some capitals among it new members. This only perpetuates the present day ‘twenty-year crisis’.
Istanbul – finally talking to the world
Obama’s visit to Istanbul is most appropriate. America’s standing in the Arab and Muslim world could not be worse. Its invasion and occupation of Arab lands and its blatant contempt of anything Arab and Muslim are errors that may take generations to repair. In mainstream Western media, the US president’s trip will be made into a big deal, but in Moscow, it is seen differently.
Moscow talks to all legitimately-elected parties and government in the Greater Middle East. It is not a big event when the US engages Turkey with the hope that it will be a conduit to start a conversation with Muslims. Russia has been doing this for centuries. Obama could and should take a page from Medvedev and engage Muslims out of simple self-interest, and not because of rigid ideological definitions like – ‘we don’t negotiate with terrorists’. Well, there are terrorists who should not be talked to, but there are people who can be talked to be talked out of acting out what may be called terrorism.
Hitler was a political terrorist. He exploited an international system that was weak and open to manipulation and revision. Carr pointed this out at the time and did urge appeasement of the Nazis, while demanding a radical change of the international order. This never happened and we are paying for the consequences to this day. Obama should take note and read more history.
In lieu of a conclusion
I don’t expect the world to change much after Obama returns to the US from Europe, but just maybe the American president will have a new grasp on the times. The paradigm shift continues and the global chorus demanding a change from ‘business as usual’ is becoming more vocal. Carr would easily understand our world. He understood that the world he lived in was fragile, even an illusion. If he were alive today, I bet he would say that the West puts too much trust into a twisted interpretation of the recent past and ideologies that have only created divisions. Obama needs to break from old orthodoxies and misperceptions. If he can, the current ‘twenty-year crisis’ might end differently than the one Carr identified.
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