Ramanan — Pankaj Mishra – The Mask That It Wears

"It" is the so-called liberal world order that anything but.

The Case for Concerted Action
Pankaj Mishra – The Mask That It Wears
V. Ramanan

Fredrico Pieraccini — The Strategic Triangle that Is Changing the World

Away from the current chaos in the United States, major developments are progressing, with Iran, Russia and China coordinating on a series of significant moves crucial for the future of the Eurasian continent. With a population of more than five billion people, constituting about two-thirds of the Earth's population, the future of humanity passes through this immense area. Signaling a major change from a unipolar world order based on Europe and the United States to a multipolar world steered by China, Russia and Iran, these Eurasian states are carving out a leading role in the development of the vast continent. As part of the challenges faced by these leading multipolar countries, the disruptive events originating in the post-WWII Euro-Atlantic world order will need to be tackled....

Strategic Culture Foundation
The Strategic Triangle that Is Changing the World
Fredrico Pieraccini

Michael Lind — Can America Share Its Superpower Status?

Forward looking.

The National Interest
Can America Share Its Superpower Status?

Michael Lind, fellow at New America, a contributing editor of the National Interest, and author of The American Way of Strategy.

Ronald Zonca — The Russian withdrawal: a message for Syria and the multipolar world

… Russian policy has delivered an important message for the emerging multipolar world. Russia is ready to assist States militarily to regain their sovereignty. We are far from Western-style neo-colonial interventions aimed at turning countries into protectorates with puppet governments.

In calling for the withdrawal of the Russian contingent in Syria, Putin has just shown that Russia knows how to use its military power to restore the democratic order in a country, and not turn it into banana republic.

Highlighting the principles of international law which are the basis of its action and the withdrawal of its forces, Russia is sending a strong message.People can count on Russia to help them recover their sovereignty within a framework of international legitimacy.….

Fort Russ
The Russian withdrawal: a message for Syria and the multipolar world

Ronald Zonca
In Boulevard Voltaire, March 16, 2016
Translated from French by Tom Winter

Sandhya Jain — Rise of a multi-polar Asia – a view from India

Moscow straddles a multipolar world and a multipolar Asia. Given that the bulk of its vast territories embrace the Asian landmass, it would be a mistake not to think of Russia as an Asian power. 

The reality that it is already a multipolar Asia would not have escaped Beijing, which in recent years is expanding its global footprint while seeking a commanding presence in its Asian neighbourhood. Given its deep economic and strategic ties with Moscow, Beijing obviously recognises that Russia will pursue its interests in Central Asia, Europe, Iran and the Islamic world, with India, and elsewhere....

The interests of all four nations [Russia, China, India, and Iran] converge in many areas. 

In fact, China’s One Belt One Road, India’s Cotton Route and Project Mausam, and the Russian-led Eurasian Economic Union (EEU), are all complementary projects based on the old land and sea-based trade routes of the ancient world. Even in the centuries BC, the land and sea commerce between India, Persia, Egypt, up to the African coast, was protected by different dynasties; China joined this trade only under the Han dynasty, but expanded it exponentially...

The Vineyard of the Saker
Rise of a multi-polar Asia – a view from India
Sandhya Jain

Edward Lozansky and Martin Sieff — Sanctions Policy Is a Massive Fail. Hurting Europe, Helping China, and Isolating... the US

Policymakers in Washington and Brussels continue in the delusion that they live in an “End of History” world where their shared liberal and democratic values are bound to win – and quickly – over every alternative economic and political system. 

However, the harsh truth remains that we live in a fragmenting world of 7 billion people where competing and very different centers of civilization and power have already emerged. It is the world predicted 21 years ago by the late American historian and geo-strategist Samuel Huntington. 

In Huntington’s multi-polar world, which, in fact, already exists, the West’s sanctions on Russia will certainly not bring Moscow to heel over Ukraine. They will backfire, creating instead the very nightmare that Washington and Brussels policymakers should avoid at all costs: The creation of a world divided between different trading and strategic blocs.
Economic sanctions are not isolating Russia: They are isolating the United States and straining the bonds of the European Union. Those outcomes are already clear.

Russia Insider | Opinion
Sanctions Policy Is a Massive Fail. Hurting Europe, Helping China, and Isolating... the US

Edward Lozansky, President of the American University in Moscow, and Martin Sieff, national columnist for the Post-Examiner online newspapers and a senior fellow of the American University in Moscow

Misha Glenny — Chinese-Russian Relations Enter Cyberspace

The biggest winner to emerge from the nasty and damaging conflict in eastern Ukraine is not even a player in the game. China is sitting quietly and watching where the crisis is taking the more engaged participants. In the process, Beijing has been able to leverage the economic difficulties that Western sanctions have created for Russia by offering Moscow new, if less lucrative, markets for Russian energy products.

Unless the Ukraine conflict is resolved and relations between the West and Russia improve, such Sino-Russian cooperation could become a more permanent feature. That would have severe unexpected consequences.…

Carnegie Europe — Strategic Europe
Chinese-Russian Relations Enter Cyberspace
Misha Glenny | British journalist who specialises in southeastern Europe global organised crime and cyber security