THE GLOBAL security order is under severe stress - and severe threat.
Decision-makers are being overwhelmed by demands for prompt action with the media adding to the confusion by constantly switching focus from one crisis to another, writes World Review Expert Professor Stefan Hedlund.
But the current global crisis also has a more fundamental dimension. Much of today's trouble has been caused by a shift in how Western academic and political circles approach problems of international security.
During the Cold War era, foreign and security policy was ruled by ‘realism’. This meant upholding spheres where the interests of one side would not be allowed to encroach on those of the other.
Following the end of the Cold War in 1991, political thinking in the West underwent a major shift. A new generation of thinkers emerged bent on securing, not interests, but the proliferation of universal values. Forces of good would be given support and deliberately-orchestrated regime change would become part of the tool kit.
This new approach may have served to create a sense of self-righteousness. It is now becoming apparent it also produced serious complications.
The introduction of values into the security dimension implied a moral obligation to intervene.
Western governments have become hostage to their own rhetoric. Interventions have been made in situations where it was far from clear how success could be achieved. Footage broadcast on television news channels would prompt hasty actions which have often made bad situations worse.
An important reason why value-based interventions have such a poor track record is that the ‘universal’ values represent Western values.
To those who advocated armed intervention in Iraq it may have seemed that the Iraqi people yearned for liberal democracy and rules-based market economy; that once the regime of Saddam Hussein had been swept away, Iraq would become safe for democracy. And then the dominoes would start to fall, sweeping away despots across the region.
But while Western policy was focussed on spreading Western values via regime change, local politicians remained committed to securing their own interests. The Iraqi’s support of Western involvement was weak to non-existent.
The example of Iraq is extreme but it does form part of a broader pattern of ‘democracy promotion’ implemented on a global scale to ensure the proliferation of Western values.
As is becoming obvious in Syria, picking winners among rival rebel group has been beyond the scope of Western intelligence agencies.
In post-communist Europe, Nato and the EU have pursued parallel policies of eastern expansion which have produced serious policy blowback.
By ignoring that Russia would view expansion as infringement of its interests, the West set itself up for a confrontation for which it was not prepared. When Moscow decided to push back, the response was to heap moral abuse on the Kremlin. But when the Russian army intervened to bring the message home, the West backed off. One may question the morality in luring countries into armed conflicts where they will be left to fend for themselves.
Beginning with Nato expansion, both Ukraine and Georgia hoped they would be offered a MAP, a Membership Action Plan - a first step towards membership - in April 2008. Although US President George Bush was in favour, the UK, France and Germany were against. The decision not to offer a MAP was accompanied by a loose promise that membership would follow.
Feeling reassured, Georgia’s President Mikheil Saakashvili pursued a policy of confrontation with Russia which in August 2008 led to open war. But when war erupted, the West ran for cover.
A similar situation arose with EU enlargement. In 2009, Brussels launched an ‘Eastern Partnership’ designed to forge closer ties with Ukraine, Georgia, Moldova and Armenia. It was a challenge to the Kremlin’s aim for those countries to join a Moscow-led Eurasian Union.
The rationale for the West’s challenge again was that every country has a right to decide freely which trade or security organisation it wishes to join.
Ukraine appears to have been shocked to find that the Eastern Partnership document envisioned that Ukraine would be integrated into the Western security structures. In November 2013, Ukraine refused to sign and those in Kiev, who had hoped for a ‘European choice’, took to the streets in protest. By February 2014 the protests became violent and the government collapsed.
As the crisis became acute, representatives of the old school of realism, such as Henry Kissinger and Zbigniew Brzezinski, suggested possible compromise solutions which advocated a traditional realist approach to finding a solution based on respect for the interests of both sides. But they were derided.
Proponents of the new format of value-based interventions repeated the right of every country to decide on its allegiance, and emphasised that Russia must not be allowed a say in Ukrainian affairs.
When newly-elected Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko opted for a military solution to the pro-Russia uprising in Donbass he may have believed that Nato would stand ready to deter Russia from launching a counter offensive. He was proved wrong, at the cost of massive material destruction and thousands of lives lost.
Publication Date:
Tue, 2014-11-04 06:00
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