These areas are now part of the battleground for control in the new Great Game based on unipolarism (continued domination of the globe by the West under the US-led "rules-based order") versus multipolarism (national sovereignty and the rule of international law, led by Russia and China). Simply put, multipolarism guarantees all countries the right to develop independently as they see fit for themselves and their circumstances, including traditions, while unipolarism requires development in accordance with the rules of the hegemon, including liberalism and Western values.
The Cradle
Central Asia is the prime battlefield in the New Great Game
The Cradle
Central Asia is the prime battlefield in the New Great Game
Pepe Escobar
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The "anaconda strategy" is designed to secure the natural resources of the region by the Western powers.
Slavyangrad
You know what this is? This is the anaconda strategy.
control and strangulation of the coastal zones of littoral countries in Africa and Asia, including India and China, emphasizing the role of force in establishing political order. By the end of World War II, it became obvious to identify the "Heartland" with the Soviet Union. The defeat of Germany enhanced the reputation of Mackinder's geopolitical concept.
Therefore, in Spykman's new model of world order, a mainland power from the "hartland" (the USSR) confronts a maritime power from the "outer crescent" (the United States), separated by a zone of contact ("rimland"). In accordance with this model, the postwar policy of containment of communism was formed in the United States. The U.S. containment of the "fortress" (the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact countries) was realized by the formation of anti-Soviet military blocs along the "rimland": NATO in Europe, CENTO in West Asia, and SEATO in East Asia. The confrontation was alternated by big and small conflicts in Berlin, Korea, Middle East, Vietnam, Cambodia and Afghanistan.
PS...As it is not difficult to understand on the basis of this geopolitical theory the relations between countries have been formed since 1904 when Alford Mackinder put forward it for the first time.
Heartland [Mackinder] versus Rimland [Spykman].
"He who controls Rimland controls Eurasia [Heartland], and he who controls Eurasia controls the destinies of the whole world"
1904 - When nuclear deterrence was a fact of life.
ReplyDelete1904 - When there was free trade instead of protectionism.
1904 - When the world's population was 8 billion.
Why would anyone believe this anachronistic nonsense?
PP "Why would anyone believe this anachronistic nonsense?"
ReplyDeleteBecause history builds on what happened before. Mackinder's 1904 article was is instrumental in the development of the thinking still shaping the world today. Mackinder's heartland theory led to the development of Spykman's rimland theory, which, when combined with Mahan's The Influence of Sea Power upon History (1890), resulted in Western geostrategy based on naval power, then air power, and now space. This led to the state of play in geopolitics and geostrategy today and it is centered on Central Asia. See the work of Zbigniew Brzezinski, especially The Grand Chessboard: American Primacy And Its Geostrategic Imperatives (1997).
The requirement for petroleum-based energy for military dominance was the reason for the focus on the Middle East, immediately post-WWII when FDR secretly departed for a meeting with King Saud, preempting Churchill and securing oil supply for the US as the emerging successor to the British Empire, the last empire to remain standing.
In Eastern Europe and as well as much of the world what happened a thousand years ago or even several thousand years ago is still influencing events if not shaping them directly. Many if not most North American Anglos, having short histories, miss this unless they have studied it
The modern military is dependent on fossil fuels - that is the only item that is factual.
ReplyDeleteWe don't live in a world that can be controlled through military dominance. I listed some of the factors that didn't exist in 1904. When idiots in positions of power dwell in the past, their actions are doomed to failure. The work of these intellectuals should be discredited so that it is rightly abandoned. If we were serious, some of them would face trial for crimes against humanity.
History is an exercise in story-telling. So here we are in 2023, with grown men talking seriously about anacondas. Stop it. 99.99% of the population have no practical need to perpetuate the stories of the past. They do other things for a living.
These areas are now part of the battleground for control in the new Great Game based on unipolarism (continued domination of the globe by the West under the US-led "rules-based order") versus multipolarism (national sovereignty and the rule of international law, led by Russia and China). Simply put, multipolarism guarantees all countries the right to develop independently as they see fit for themselves and their circumstances, including traditions, while unipolarism requires development in accordance with the rules of the hegemon, including liberalism and Western values.
ReplyDeleteTrade is based upon rules. If international law applied to trade, there would be environmental and labour standards, and arbitrage would mostly evaporate.
International law condemns the coup in Niger. Was it not condemned in a UN vote?
Yet we have the anti-imperialist press celebrating the event.
Color me skeptical that international law is to be respected in the future. The same hypocrisy that Washington is guilty of will be continued by other large economic powers.
If national sovereignty were respected, geopolitics would be benign form of diplomacy.
So realistically, there are no "guarantees" being offered here. US imperialism is grinding towards an end, but strictly for military/logistical reasons.