WHAT MADE THE SUPERPOWER USA, CHINA, RUSSIA, AND EUROPEAN COUNTRIES TO COME TO THIS POWER?

After miserably failing in Iraq and Afghanistan, the American attack on Libya seems doomed from the very beginning. The consequences of this attack will be much worse for America and the West than the attacks on Iraq and Afghanistan. The level of opposition to this attack has started much sooner than the other attacks. One of the emerging trends is that Russia, China, and India have started opposing the attack. Their criticism of the attack is almost running parallel. Even the Arab countries which supported the no-fly zone are having second thoughts. Similarly, many African countries are now criticizing the attack.
The western hypocrisy and double standards are becoming clear from the very beginning. Many countries feel that the western countries tricked them to get the resolution passed in the Security Council. The western countries had advocated for the protection of the civilian population. However, the real intention of the western countries is the change of regime. The West does not like any leader who stands up to their treachery, arrogance, and domination. This was the reason they killed Saddam, his sons, and even his 10 years old grandson. For the same reason, they now want to kill Gaddafi. They have already killed his daughter and son. Can the killing of children be called civilized behavior or should it be called cruel and barbaric behavior?
Just because America has a black President does not prove that the minorities are treated any better. Actually, the minorities continue to receive unequal, unfair, and repressive treatment. Obama was made the President because he was very popular in Europe. Bush was extremely hated by the European allies. They not only disliked him, but were embarrassed by his ignorance and extremely low level of intelligence. Obama has been able to revive the traditional western alliance. France and Britain are playing the leading role in the American attack on Libya. However, this has changed Bush’s concept of an alliance of America, Israel, and India against Islam and China. Russia was also trying to form an alliance with Western Europe to form a European block to challenge the American hegemony. However, Western Europe has again started leaning toward the U.S.A.
The fiasco in Afghanistan, the error of judgment on Bosnia and policy failure on Vietnam-Kampuchea should have been eye-openers for Russia and China. These failures should have compelled former communist bloc countries to review their foreign policy and read the prevailing trend. But the current stand of Russia and China on Syria and muted response to the uprising in Libya are manifestation of a confused diplomacy that is motivated by short-term economic interests and a brazen apathy to the people’s suffering. If the Russian adventure in Afghanistan in mid-70s was a Himalayan blunder, then its role in the Bosnia-Serb conflict, its stand alongside China on Egypt and a muted response to the uprising in Libya have been yet more examples of short-term vision. Russian and Chinese perspective on the Middle East crises has always been misplaced and as a result they have been losing their allies and strategic partners in the region. Although very different in its approach on domestic issues, when it comes to foreign policy, the Chinese stand is very similar to that of Russia. In some ways, China gives the impression that it is toeing the Russian line. Russia in the 60s was a key player in the region and never allowed America and its allies to penetrate its base. But Russia’s lack of support to Arabs in the 1967 war virtually threw the entire Middle East into the lap of the United States. The exceptions were Syria, Libya and Lebanon, etc.
When the wind of change and Arab Spring started in the Middle East and there was a mass upsurge in Egypt, the West, led by United States and motivated by their long-term interests, read the mood of the people and responded positively to the movement against their closest ally Hosni Mubarak. Russia and China never took any definite stand and remained alienated, while the world community celebrated the victory of peoples’ uprising.
In the Libyan uprising, initially both Russia and China supported the Qaddafi regime and later remained confused in their support to NTC (National Transitional Council). Even today when Qaddafi is more or less ousted from power, China and Russia both are still not supporting the NTC wholeheartedly though they have reluctantly recognized it.
In Syria, Russia and China have again ignored the popular sentiment and are motivated by their economic interest without realizing that gradually they are being alienated and marginalized. China, in any case, has never been a major player in the Middle East and its foreign policy in the region is more dictated by mega projects than by any diplomacy or political ethics and realities.
Russia believes that recovery of its economy is a must in order to restore Russia’s superpower status, and therefore, its diplomatic focus and international relations are determined through economic tools, like arms trade agreements that made Russia the No. 1 arms supplier to the Middle East. According to defense experts, Russian arms sales to Algeria and Syria constituted about one-eighth of Russia’s portfolio of arms orders worldwide.
These factors forced Russia to take a firmer stand on possible international intervention in Syria. Since Damascus means not only economic gains but also political card for Moscow, a possible regime change has the potential to affect Russian influence in the region much more than any other country.
However, Russia has to understand that the wind of change blowing in the Middle East is a serious phenomenon and has the complete involvement of the masses. It is not restricted to Libya and Syria; in the near future it might engulf many other countries of the region and, therefore, it is about time for both Russia and China to seriously review their policy and understand the voice of people and respect their judgment. In their own Marxist jargon, what is happening in Egypt, Syria and Libya is nothing short of a peoples’ uprising and if Russia wishes to protect its economic interests in the region and wants to continue playing a dominant role, it must take the bold step of supporting the people’s movement. It is a historic and very decisive moment in history. The Middle East has risen. People have passed their verdict saying “Enough is enough,” and if countries like Russia and China fail to listen to the peoples’ voice and continue to be apathetic then they will lose the Middle East with disastrous consequences for their economies.
UN Security Council vote authorizing the imposition of a no-fly zone and other measures against Muammar Gaddafi’s forces in Libya was something less than an emphatic mandate. A number of observers have noted the unusually high number of abstentions, and that all of them came from such major international players as Germany, Brazil, India, Russia, and China.
The votes by Brazil and India did not come as a great surprise. Both countries have long records of skepticism about military adventurism—even adventurism under the color of international authority. Germany’s abstention raised more than a few eyebrows, since it signaled a clear policy breach between Berlin and its traditional NATO allies (and European Union partners) Britain and France, as well as the United States.
But the most significant development was the decision of both Russia and China to abstain. Since they are among the five permanent members of the Council, a negative vote by either country would have vetoed the resolution. Given their repeated, vocal assertions about the importance of respecting national sovereignty, and their previous wariness about giving a UN imprimatur to military interventions, many experts in the weeks leading up to the vote expected one or both countries to cast a veto. After all, the United States and its allies bypassed the UN Security Council regarding both the Kosovo war and the Iraq war precisely because they knew that “no” votes from Russia and China were virtually certain.
Their decision to abstain on the Libya resolution begs the question of why they were so cooperative this time. And that leads to a subsidiary question relevant to all political outcomes, domestic or international: what concessions did the winning party (in this case, primarily the United States) have to make to gain its policy victory?
We may not be able to determine that answer with any certainty for months or years—or conceivably not for decades, when the pertinent documents are declassified. But there is little question that there had to be concessions. Neither Moscow nor Beijing regards foreign policy as an altruistic enterprise. The United States paid something to get them to abstain rather than cast a veto.It would be naïve in the extreme to assume that the United States secured its diplomatic victory in the Security Council without having to make some significant policy concessions to the two permanent members who reluctantly withheld their vetoes.


Post published by CHANDAN VISWAS