We are experiencing times of global transition. Where we have been is self-evident. Where the world is headed remains obscure. Some states are implacably resisting that transition; others strive to foster a modified international system that conforms to emerging realities. The actions of governments in the two categories are reinforcing each other’s commitments to pursuing these incompatible tacks. There’s the rub.

This is the context for the major crises over Ukraine, in the Middle East, and over Taiwan. Ongoing war in the first two carries the potential for escalation with dire, far-reaching consequences. Each is at once symptomatic of the systemic changes occurring in world affairs and the cause for a raising of the stakes in how that transition is handled or mishandled.

Dilemma 1 USA

There is a lot of talk about how Donald Trump will move quickly to resolve the Ukraine conflict. Maybe not within the advertised 24 hours – but supposedly he sees the pointlessness of an open-ended war with Russia. So, he is expected to get in touch with Putin, personally and / or via a designated envoy, to make a deal. We have heard hints of what the ingredients could be: a ceasefire, the lure of reduced sanctions, some recognition of a special Russian association with the four oblasts Moscow has annexed, Crimea ceded, the remainder of Ukraine autonomous with links to the EU if not NATO.

The sequencing, the specifics, ancillary trade-offs are cloudy. To the minds of the more optimistic commentators, an eventual agreement is likely since Trump wants to be unburdened of the Ukraine albatross, since he is not a fan of NATO expansion or NATO itself, since he wants to concentrate on dismantling the federal government while pressing ahead with the rest of the MAGA agenda. Relations with Russia, as with every other foreign power, will be treated in terms of bilateral dealing wherein the US focuses on the trade-offs, i.e. how much it gains as opposed to how much it gives.

It is by no means clear that this approach could achieve the stated goal of ending the war in Ukraine and easing the tense confrontation with Russia. For the Kremlin has set stipulations for a peaceful resolution that could only be met by a broader accord than is visualized in the horse trading anticipated by the Trump entourage and like-minded think tankers.

Russia will not stop the fighting until a firm agreement has been reached. That is one. It will not accept any ambiguity as to the future status of the Russophile territories in question. That’s two. It will not tolerate leaving in place a Kiev government controlled by the rabid anti-Russian nationalists who have run it since 2014. That’s three. It will demand a treaty that formally neutralizes Ukraine on the model of post-war Austria. That’s four. It will press hard for the constitution of a pan-European security architecture which accords Russia a legitimate place. That’s five.*

The implication is that the prospects are dim for a quick, short-term deal that leaves these sensitive issues indeterminate and open to the vagaries of politics in Washington and European capitals. It appears unrealistic that Trump will have the discretionary power, the political will or the strategic vision to design and to implement a multifaceted plan as required to weave together the varied strands of the European security fabric. It is one thing to intimidate the Europeans into taking on a fuller responsibility for their own security by threatening to leave them to their own devices. It is something far more demanding to recast the American relationship with its European allies, with Russia, with other interested, neighbouring parties.

For meeting that wider challenge has as its precondition a comprehensive redrawing by the United States of the imprinted mental map of the world system. For it is being transformed in basic ways which are at variance with the deep-seated American presumptions of dominance, control and privilege.

Trump is not the man to man to replace the prevailing strategic vision and America’s paramount position in the world with something more refined and in correspondence to the emerging multi-nodule system. Although instinctively he is more of an America firster than a hegemonic imperialist, his actions will be piecemeal and disjointed rather than pieces of an artful new pattern.

Even in regard to specific matters like Ukraine or Taiwan it is impossible simply to snap one’s fingers and on impulse shift course. A carefully thought through design and the crafting of a subtle diplomacy is the prerequisite. Donald Trump, incontrovertibly, has no plan, no strategy, no design for any area of public policy. He is incapable of doing so; for he lacks the necessary mental concentration and organized knowledge. The same holds for dealing with China.

[The focal shift from Russia in Europe to China in Asia is less a mechanism for coping with defeat in Ukraine than the pathological reaction of a country that, feeling a gnawing sense of diminishing prowess, can manage to do nothing more than try one final throw of the dice in a vain attempt at proving to itself that it still has the right stuff – since living without that exalted sense of self is intolerable.]

Were Trump to take a series of purely tactical actions that have the net effect of lowering American presence globally, he would be running against the grain of fundamental national beliefs. Belief in the country’s birth under a Providential star to lead the world along the path of enlightenment, belief in American exceptionalism, belief in American superiority (the last jeopardized by signs of losing a battle with a superior armed Russia, by signs of losing an economic battle with a technologically superior China).

Moreover, many Americans’ faith in these national myths is bound closely to their own individual sense of self-esteem that already is felt to be under threat in this age of anxiety. Trump is hardly the one to guide them to a mature appreciation of what America is and who they are.**

Dilemma 2 Russia & China

These two great powers, who are the principal obstacles to the United States’ retention of its dominant global position, face a quite different dilemma. Put simply, it is how to deal with an America that remains blind in vision and impervious in policy to the epochal changes reshaping the configuration of the world system. To the extent that Washington does feel the vibrations from this tectonic shift, political leaders are seen as reacting impulsively to deny its practical consequences in striving to assert an endangered supremacy.

That compulsion leads American policymakers to set ever more arduous challenges to prove that nothing fundamental has changed. Hence, the drive to overturn a strategic commitment made half a century ago by pressing by every means for Taiwan’s autonomy. Hence, its strenuous efforts to prevent Russia from assuming a place in European (and Middle Eastern) affairs commensurate with its national interests, its strength and its geography.

[The minimalist aim has been to sever its ties to the Europe of the EU - thereby marginalizing it as a peripheral, inconsequential state. The maximalist aim has been to provoke regime change producing of a weaker, Western-friendly provider of cheap natural resources and open to predatory Western finance. A sharecropper on the West’s global plantation - as one Russian diplomat bluntly put it. Project Ukraine was to be the spearhead].

From this perspective, Moscow and Beijing face a dilemma of a singular nature. They must devise elaborate strategies to stymie American plans to perpetuate its dominance by undermining the growing political, economic and – derivatively diplomatic – strength of these perceived rivals. Containment both in broadly security terms and in terms of their impressive national achievements - the latter diminishes the American (Western) claim to representing the one true path to political stability and economic sell-being.

Resistance to those plans by the Russians and Chinese has become the overriding strategic imperative in both capitals as manifest in their intensifying collaboration in all spheres. As they see the situation, that momentous move is dictated by the reckless conduct of a fading, flailing superpower still in possession of an enormous strength to disrupt and to destroy.

Still, when it comes to direct confrontations with Washington over Ukraine or Taiwan, they are obliged to temper their actions so as to avoid provoking an unwanted crisis with an America they view as unpredictable and unstable. That concern applies to a Trump presidency as much as it does to the outgoing Biden presidency. Striking the correct balance is a daunting challenge.

The upshot is that Putin and Xi tread carefully in treating with their feckless Western counterparts who disregard the elementary precepts of diplomacy. We are fortunate in the temper of Chinese and Russian leadership. Xi and Putin are rare leaders. They are sober, rational, intelligent, very well informed, capable of broad vision, they do not harbour imperial ambitions, and while dedicated to securing their national interests are not bellicose. Moreover, they have long tenures as heads of state and are secure in power. They have the political capital to invest in projects of magnitude whose prospective payoffs will be well into the future.

Dilemma 3. THE EUROPEANS

European political and foreign policy elites are even less self-aware of their untenable circumstances than the Americans. The latter are as one in their blunt conviction that the United States could and should continue to play the dominant role in world affairs. The former have made no considered judgment of their own other than it is imperative to frame their conceptions and strategies to accord with what their superior partner thinks and does. Therein lies the heart of their dilemma.

For the past 75 years, the Europeans have lived in a state of near total strategic dependence on the United States. That has had profound lasting effects. They extend beyond practical calculations of security needs. Now, more than 30 years after European leaders were relieved from any meaningful military threat, they remain politically and psychologically unable to exercise the prerogatives and responsibility of sovereignty – individually or collectively. They are locked into a classic dominant-subordination relationship with America. So deeply rooted, it has become second nature to political elites.

[The extremity of the prerogatives granted the United States to act in disregard for European autonomy and interests was demonstrated in Washington’s destruction of the Baltic gas pipeline. That extraordinary episode punctuated the unqualified Europeans’ commitment to serve as an America satrap in its all-out campaign to prevent China as well Russia from challenging its hegemony. Securing the obedience of the European economic power bloc undeniably represents a major strategic success for the United States.

[So does cutting off Russia’s access to capital investment, technology and rich markets to the West. The heaviest costs are being paid though, by the Europeans. In effect, they have mortgaged their economic future for the sake of participating in the ill-thought through severing all connection with what now is an implacably antagonist Russia whose abundant energy and agricultural resources have been a prime element in their prosperity and political stability.]

Under that unnatural condition, European governments have inflicted serious damage on themselves. Moreover, they have jeopardized their strategic and economic future. By following Washington’s lead in the campaign to neutralize Russia as a presence in continental affairs – dating from 2008, they have cut themselves off from their natural partner in natural resource trade, technological development and investment. They have institutionalized a hostile relationship with a neighbour who is a major world power. They have made themselves the residual custodians of a bankrupt, corrupt Ukrainian rump state which carries heavy financial cost.

Furthermore, in the process they have undermined the legitimacy of their democratic institutions in ways that open the door to radical Far Right movements. These deleterious consequences are reinforced by the Europeans signing on to the no-holds-barred American economic-cum-political war against China. This latter misguided action reverses the EU’s eminently sensible prior policy of deepening economic ties with the world’s rising superpower.

The net effect of this unthinking relegation of European countries to becoming de facto American vassals is a distancing themselves from the world beyond the trans-Atlantic community. When we add to the tilting scales the alienation of global opinion disgusted by Western enthusiastic support for the Palestinian genocide, we discern an historic retrenchment. The once proud rulers of the globe are circling-the-wagons in a defensive posture against forces they barely understand and have no plan for engaging.

Europe’s feeble response to this formidable challenge is a series of schematic plans that are little more than placebos mislabelled as potent medication. The EU’s proposed answer to its acute energy predicament is a vaguely sketched strategy whose central element is a diversification of suppliers alongside acceleration of green energy projects. Various initiatives in this direction taken over the past two years give reason for skepticism.

The main substitute for Russian natural gas has been LNG from the United States; attempts to form preferential arrangements with other suppliers (like Qatar) have come up short. Relying on the U.S. has its drawbacks. American LNG is 3-4 times costlier than pipeline Russian gas. Trump’s declaration that limiting exports will dampen inflationary pressures raises doubts about that supposed reliability.

Most telling is the disconcerting fact that European countries clandestinely have somewhat eased their energy penury by buying Russian oil and gas on the very large grey market. Indeed, there is statistical data indicating that the EU states, at one point this year, were importing more Russian sourced LNG than American LNG!

In the security realm, there is much talk in Brussels about building a purely European security apparatus – linked to NATO while capable of acting independently of the United States. This is an updated and upgraded revival of an idea from the late 1990s that birthed the now moribund Common Security and Defense Policy. This commotion could be taken as just play-acting given that there is no concrete threat to European security outside the fevered imaginations of a political class inflamed by loud American alarums that Putin is bent on restoring the Soviet Empire and dreams of washing his boots in the English Channel, if not the Irish Sea. Moreover, there are the provocative Russian actions in relentlessly moving its border closer to NATO military installations.

The likelihood of the current blue-skying producing anything substantial is slim. Europe lacks the money in its current stressed financial condition, it lacks the industrial base to equip modern armed forces, and it most certainly lacks the political will. Yes, we hear a lot of bombast issuing from Ursula von der Leyen, Emmanuel Macron, Mark Rutte and their fellow dreamers of a federal European Union. The truth is captured in a saying that we have here in Texas: “All hat and no cattle!”

The glaring omission is any cogent, realistic diplomatic strategy that corresponds to the present configuration of forces in the world. Instead, we see a heightening of anti-Russian rhetoric, solemn pledges to accompany Ukraine on its path to ultimate victory, and joining Washington in ever harsher measures against China cast as an economic predator and security threat.

Notes

* President Trump’s policies toward Russia were no different in nature than Bush /Obama /Biden’s: sanctions, arming Ukraine. The seeming difference in attitude toward Putin the man derives from Trump’s abiding faith in and relishing of deal-making. To do so with somebody as formidable as Putin serves his voracious narcissistic ego.

** There is one trait in Trump’s malign make-up that offers some small consolation. He is a coward, a blustering bully who evades any direct encounter with an opponent who will stand up to him (even running away from a second debate with Kamala Harris who roughed him up in the first one). Trump has neither the stomach nor the mental strength for a serious brawl /war. Small blessing!