In the past few years the feeling that the Western elites have actually lost their minds in a fit of raging obstinacy and arrogance has crystallized within my thoughts, to be reinforced by the events of the past year. The deep underlying feelings of racial and civilizational supremacism that underlay the crazed responses to attempts by the “Rest” to gain some power within the international system were fully on display when Josep Borrell, the European Union representative for Foreign Affairs and Security, said publicly what is only supposed to be spoken in private. Of course, the West’s obedient media studiously ignored his comments that “Europe is a garden and the rest of the world is a jungle”; comments that certainly would not go unnoticed in the “jungles” of China, India, and Latin America etc. His ability to remain in his position after such an utter diplomatic disaster is a testament to the sheer blasé arrogance of the EU potentates. It may come as a surprise that Mr. Borrell is actually one of the more progressive members of the EU hierarchy, although he has certainly not shown that in his attitudes towards China and Russia; a great example of what passes for a European “socialist” in the 2020s.
When I see the West face plant time after time through its inability to compromise to make, and keep allies, the image of senior Western officials screaming “how dare you” in the classic Greta Thunberg mold tends to appear. After so many centuries of ordering the rest of the world around, the Western elites can simply not accept other nations as anywhere near their equals. Some subjectivist international relations scholars have coined the term “ontological security” to capture the possibility of human beings, and groups of human beings, to make self-harming decisions to protect their inner construction of their identity. In psychology, there is the concept of “cognitive dissonance” where input from the external world may contradict a person’s self-image or world view and instead of reacting functionally to that input the person rejects the input to protect their self-image/worldview. After five centuries plus of dominating the world, and with the triumphant Western victory of the “unipolar moment” of the 1990s so close in time, the Western elites are unable to let go of racial/civilizational supremacist beliefs. “How dare the lesser nations think that they are anywhere equal to the Western ones?”, is the animus that underlies the Western response to the emerging multipolar world. Yes, there may be substantive political economic considerations behind Western obstinacy, but the utter Western dogmatism and obstinacy on display speaks to more than just rational considerations. The very thought of a China, or even worse a Russia or Iran, being equal to Western nations and having lessons that may be of value to them is seen as utterly unacceptable even at a visceral level. These nations can only ever be seen as “lesser than”, and how dare they consider themselves equals let alone superior to the European/Western “gardens”.
Over a period of a quarter of a century this has led to one horrendous Western policy error after another. The inability to treat Russia as a nation worthy of having legitimate security concerns that should be respected, turning into an enemy of the West that it never wanted to be. The blind assumption that China would become just like another Japan, economically prosperous but firmly under the Western thumb. The inability to come to amicable terms with Iran, undermining rather than helping to foster its liberal elites. Now these three nations, thrown together by a common enemy represent the core of the anti-West alliance. But the foreign policy madness stretches much farther than that:
· The wanton destruction of the wealthiest nation in Africa, Libya, the torture and murder of a head of state that was leaning toward the West and the immiseration of its people. This may have played well in the propagandized West but was seen for what it was by the Rest, especially the lesson that trying to be the West’s friend just makes it easier for the West to overthrow you.
· The 20-year disaster that was the Afghan invasion and occupation. After spending multiples of Afghan GDP every year for two decades the West left the country worse off than before they had invaded, with corrupt elites fleeing with planeloads of gold and US$’s. Only a small amount of that money invested in real development would have gained the “hearts and minds” as Mao so well showed in post-war China. Instead, the US punished the Afghan people for their ungratefulness by stealing their US$8.5 billion reserves – literally the money they needed for food. Guaranteed to drive Afghan into the hands of Iran, Russia and China.
· The inability to admit defeat in Iraq and Syria, leading to the utterly horrendous mistake of assassinating Iranian and Iraqi officials in Iraq without that nation’s leaders’ pre-knowledge, and the illegal occupation of Syria. The brutal sanctions against Syria, again as collective punishment for not saying “uncle”, also send a message of the true nature of Western elites. The logical outcome is a very significant increase in the Iranian and Russian influence in the region.
· The utterly botched attempted coup in the fence-sitting Kazakhstan that moved that nation off the fence and more toward the Russian sphere.
· The botched coup against the West-leaning Belarussian leader, now forced fully into the Russian camp by pure survival instincts. This is an excellent piece on that utter Western foreign policy disaster.
· The reversal of the opening up policy with Cuba due to the Cuban émigré parasites that now sit within the US political brain. The most dangerous thing to the Cuban state would be a significant opening up to Western capitalism only 90 miles away, repeating perhaps the experience of East Germany. But no, the possibility was thrown away.
· The forty-year campaign against the will of the Nicaraguan people after they overthrew the dictator Somoza. The Nicaraguan people are not deemed fit to create their own version of the European “garden”, that can only be learnt at the disciplinary knee of the West.
The list is too long to cover in full, but what it shows is the complete inability of the West to even tactically compromise to gain strategic advantage. Instead, the aggressively obstinate position continues to be used well past the short window of the unipolar moment. It is akin to a mafia boss thrashing around at the “treachery” of his minions, “how dare they” he shouts, “I am the boss”. The more he attempts to bring the minions back in line, the more his power ebbs and the closer the knives approach. His consigliere advises of the benefits of a tactical compromise, but this is not acceptable to the gang boss so used to being on top. To accept less is like a psychic death. The reaction of the West to Putin’s 2008 Munich speech comes to mind; a collective “how dare you” and “who the hell do you think you are?” Such arrogance was evident in the fundamental miscalculation of Russia’s ability to withstand the West’s sanctions and the Rest’s unwillingness to help what they see as an increasingly obstinate, bigoted West undermine Russia; they know that it will never allow them to rise as long as it keeps the whip hand in the international system.
The deep Western antipathy to any other nation that considers itself to be an equal is on display with respect to Turkey. Years ago, they could have brought this strategically located nation into the EU-fold, but instead they kept it forever waiting. When it then committed the original sin of purchasing Russian anti-aircraft systems its currency was attacked, sanctions levied, and a failed coup initiated. In addition, the US continues to support the very Kurds that Turkey considers to be an enemy and terrorist group. Even after all this, Erdogan would not get off the fence and embrace Russia and Iran – lost in his dreams of a “Greater Turkey”. Instead of backing off and wooing Erdogan, especially when he blocked the admission of Finland and Sweden to NATO, the West has upped the ante by triggering Greek aggressive actions. So now we hear rumbles of Turkey making peace with Syria; a loss to the West of un-estimable proportions. Does the West back down? No, instead we get greater shrieks of “how dare they”. As the Atlantic Council article so accurately puts it, “the unwillingness of the European Union and the United States to deliver and introduce a solid plan that addresses Turkish needs is the real reason why Ankara is taking such a high risk by speaking to Damascus”. How dare the nation have its own needs that it expects the West to accept!
The US administration is readying a new diplomatic tour of Africa to supposedly offset the increasing influence of China and Russia on the continent. Given the usual demeanour of such tours I can see little chance of real success as sending the message of “what the hell has got into to you boy, don’t you understand that we are your master?” even shrouded in pretty diplomatic wording will not be taken as an offering of genuine friendship and respect; as the South African foreign minister has previously made plain. Hopefully for the US its attempted charm offensive will not be the disaster that the US Vice President’s South East Asia trip was. Burkina Faso is just the latest African nation to toss European “help” out of their nation, just as Mali has.
The height of Western madness is its inability to come to terms with the new Russia, digging itself deeper and deeper into a hole rather than reappraising the situation. We now have the provision of main battle tanks to the Ukrainian army, threats to steal Russia’s foreign assets and illegally hand them over to Ukraine, and moves to set up war crimes tribunals (for the Russians of course, not for the Ukrainians, nor the European military personnel in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Somalia etc.), on top of ludicrous attempts to put a cap on the price of Russian fossil fuel exports, as the latest crazed motions of the Western elites. These remind me of the time in my youth that I accidentally washed a contact lens with saline solution and placed it in my eye; the logical part of my brain had to work hard to stop other parts of my brain from tearing my eye out. The Europeans seem to utterly lack the ability to curb their madness from tearing apart their industrial core, immiserating their populations, destroying their beloved “garden”. and massively shrinking their geopolitical independence and importance; even down to accepting the obvious US destruction of the Nordstream pipelines without public remonstration. The lunatic US elites consider that they have “won” by tying Europe to US fossil fuel supplies instead of those from Russia, while stealing Europe’s energy-intensive industries. In reality all they have done is break Europe’s legs while competing jointly in the geopolitical equivalent of a three-legged man race; the now disabled Europe will become a heavy burden to carry around.
After the crossing of the red line of main battle tanks, the ever-ravenous Ukraine is shrieking for fighter jets – F16s. Along this path of incremental madness that cannot accept any compromise with Russia lies a direct NATO-Russia confrontation, with the obvious risk of nuclear escalation; especially with the “toy soldier” nature of the NATO conventional forces. Across the globe, the West is setting up another such geopolitical cul-de-sac in Taiwan which it wants to enter with a China that can never be accepted as an equal. It seems to me that the Western foreign policy elites and their pay-masters hate Donald Trump so much not just because he delayed their Ukraine plans but also that he is not as mad as they are; he may be infested with the usual US-supremacist beliefs but seems to be more mindful of the realities of nuclear confrontation. That he is possibly the best possible outcome for US foreign policy shows the incredible depth of madness that has gripped the Western elites. As Alexander Mercouris put it so well “they don’t have a reverse gear”, so down the geopolitical cul-de-sac they will continue – all the way to the end unless someone or something intervenes.
Absolute quality write-up again, deserves a wider readership!