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Mainstream, Vol XLVIII, No 26, June 19, 2010

Uneasy Sits the Global Balance

Sunday 20 June 2010, by Rakesh Gupta

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Whoever said that unipolarity assures peace and eternity? The global economy went into a huddle for real estate failure allowing the millions to turn violent on social issues in Western capital. Daniel Harvey, the reputed economist, suggested a revolution in economic policies away from the current unproductive real estate investments. The current policies do not contribute to happiness of the millions. It is only adding to the feel good factor of the middle and upper classes from Beijing and Moscow to Washington and London. In the last one month as a result of the infighting among the elites in a globalised world, shuttle diplomacy of sorts was witness to some kind of fire-fighting missions of Hillary Clinton, Medvedev, the Chinese leadership, and the search for less corrupt leadership alternatives in Japan, Sarkozy’s headaches about the exposé of his wife et al.. Multipolar leadership is active in fire-fighting within and without their respective power structures. They are worried about each other’s coercive apparatus. Canada’s grounds for visa refusal to former Indian security persons is as indicative of the rot in world politics as the US opposition to the Iranian-Turkish oil deal or the heckles that its policy towards Israel-Gaza current crisis is creating among the conservative circles. This is no small matter. Iran has come forward to help Turkey’s humanitarian turn to the Palestinians. The US is caught in the emerging maelstrom.

The unipolar US power cancelled Obama’s trip to South-East Asia over the real issue of Israel’s attack on the Turkish flotilla and revolts against it especially in Indonesia near UN offices and US embassy involving 250 to 4000 demonstrators. The very Muslims with whom he wanted to connect in the land of his childhood are up in demonstrations. The other concern of the US, namely, Iran’s nukes, is also impacted by the Israeli intransigence on the Turkish flotilla of peaceful aid. A few days ago the British archival material showed up shady Israeli behaviour over the nuclear proliferation with South Africa. This fuels Iranian fears. The present US negotiations with European powers, China and Russia to get a UN resolution on sanctions will be difficult to implement even if passed. China and Russia have asked the US to go slow on it. The US concern over the North Korean sinking of the South Korean ship has led to a China-Russia meeting to demand the availability of the knowledge behind the reasons of the sinking of the South Korean ship. The cancellation of the US naval exercises and the announcement of the Russian naval exercises in this region is another significant event. The US has also renewed its agreement about its base in Japan to be shifted to another island.

The problems of the Obama Administration’s diplomacy are further compounded at the bilateral and multilateral levels. In Europe it has to deal with a stronger Russo-German relationship that is presently being discussed by the German and Russian Presidents, Merkel and Medvedev, respectively. The Russians will be happy if the Germans allow the Russians visa relaxation to travel to EU countries, among other things. The Russians are keen to assure the Germans of their responsible behaviour over Israel, Iran and Afghanistan. The Russian drive for internal modernisation has made them go soft towards the US and Europe owing to Obama’s soft line and the rising power of China. A greater future Russo-German collaboration may be heralding a futuristic Cold War chill for the US. The latter suddenly decided to send Patriot missiles to Poland, after dragging its feet to the extent that Poland felt it was not interested in the issue. In contrast going by signals the Russians are accommodative of the Poles. Putin bowed before their memorial and helped in investigation of the aircraft tragedy involving the Polish leadership.

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In this context the happenings over Ukraine are noteworthy and interesting. Hillary Clinton is slated to visit Ukraine in July for having a discussion on developing bilateral relations with the Ukrainian Foreign Minister, Kostyantyn Hrshchenko. Already some new developments have taken place here. The Russain and Ukrainians have entered into a new partnership treaty, after the earlier one on strategic relations and humanitarian and economic aspects expired in 2009. The Russo-Ukranian relations have had a turbulent post-communist past but not much could be done to attract Ukraine to become a pivot of East European counter-balance to Russia. In those early days there were the disputes over the Black Sea nuclear assets of Russia that Kravchuk claimed then, the problems related to dependent Ukranian economy and its territory hosting the defensive military systems. Now Ukraine’s President Vicktor Yanukovich’s recommendations on the draft law on fundamentals of the country’s domestic policy and adopted by their Parliament would suggest that it may not seek NATO membership. Further, in Russia’s Near Abroad it is reported that the Russians are using the violent anti-government protests in their own interest; this points towards Russian consolidation in the region which experienced Cold War not too long ago. This is true especially in Kyrgyzstan, where the opposing US-Russian military were present in Manas and Kant air bases. The Russians have adopted their ten-year modernisation plan as well. If they economically turn the corner, a Russo-German pact would be a matter to contend with.

The recent US-China strategic dialogue on Iran and Korea, as per Hillary Clinton, has not made much headway. So there was no strategic progress. She mentioned that progress was notable on the economic issues of revaluating the Chinese currency vis-a-vis the dollar. The future of their strategic relationship will also depend on what happens in Taiwan which has not seen any movement in Sino-Taiwan bilateral relations.

The US-Afghan-Pakistan policy is faced with problems of achievers in a just balance with India and Pakistan as far as the region of Afghanistan is concerned. The current US policy tilted towards Pakistan in Afghanistan, even though during Foreign Minister S. M. Krishna’s recent visit Washington lauded India’s effort to build Afghanistan with aid to the tune of $ 1.3 billion. The larger Pakistani role in military terms is not going to meet the Indian demand for Pakistan doing more on the terrorism front in south Punjab, PoK apart from North Waziristan where the current Pakistani effort seems to be concentrated. The Taliban continue to exist in South Waziristan. India’s problems with Pakistani terror remain even if the Indo-Pak dialogue is a positive feature. The US media was reminded by the visiting Indian Foreign Minister in Washington that India is not a trade recipient like Pakistan is. It is a trade partner of the US. India-US-China relationship has not yet played its nuance though some signals are available. It is yet difficult to say which way this will turn. India-China relations over trade have future prospects as was noted during the visit of President Pratibha Patil to Beijing.

So even if the US continues to be at the centre-stage in the unipolar world, it sits uneasily in practically every region of the world. How long will the US sustain this role for the world (this is not band-wagoning, as much as earlier)? There is no denying the fact that in strategic terms an alternative to it has not emerged, but it presides uneasily despite Hillary’s platter. Its current cuisines are Indo-Chinese, Russo-Chinese, Russo-German, Indo-Pakistan, Iran-Turkish, US-Israeli, Israeli- Gaza-Turkish-Iranian, Russo-Ukranian-German, Indo-Afghan-Pak, Chinese-Korean-US. Delicious, savoury but difficult to take. Even if one knows about Obama’s Indian flutter, will the metaphor of world slide, that the African slide back into darkness represents, vanish? That will pose a challenge in future apart from the ones one can see on the basis of the elite conflicts in world capitals. This is still not a multipolar world.

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