They are so recent, and yet they seem so far away; those 20-odd years during which the United States happened to be the sole hegemon of global stature. Now, a new cold war between Moscow and Washington is taking shape at an alarming pace. Never, since the Cuban missile crisis in October 1962, has direct military confrontation between Russia and the United States -- and not only conflict through proxies -- appeared to be as plausible as it looks today.
Then you have China, whose sovereignty claims over the South China Sea pose a major challenge to U.S. allies in that region and, consequently, raise the specter of a military showdown involving the United States.
Given the profound readjustment of the international balance of power that has taken place during the past few years, the methods of dealing with crises and conflicts will have to be thought of afresh, and adjusted to the new circumstances.
Abandoning past pretense
We need to essentially abandon a basic postulate of U.S. foreign policy, namely that America’s involvement in world affairs can and should be geared toward the resolution of conflicts.
That postulate doesn’t work in the emerging multipolar order, for one simple reason: The priority of the contending powers -- Russia and China -- is to expand their weight and influence, and edge out as much as possible the leading hegemon, the United States. (Yes, the struggle for primacy is a zero-sum game.) Those powers are less interested, if at all, in preventing or solving conflicts than they are in playing the gadflies of the United States.
This is not only the case for Russia, which in practice doesn’t hide its intention to be the spoiler of U.S. intentions, but also for China, as reflected in the fact that Beijing has provided little help, if any, to U.S.-led efforts aimed at thwarting North Korea’s nuclear ambitions. Hence the need for a new foreign-policy paradigm, one that puts aside the objective of solving conflicts, and instead tries to play with them.
Uncle Sam the smart meddler
There is a country that has much to teach about the usefulness of joggling with conflicts as opposed to solving them. That country is Israel.
Ever since its inception in 1948, Israel has owed its survival and its success to what Natan Sachs, a fellow at the Center for Middle East Policy, Brookings Institution, characterizes as the “belief that there are currently no solutions to the challenges the country faces and that seeking quick fixes to intractable problems is dangerously naive."
This aversion to unreachable or false solutions and the preference for dealing with conflicts in an ad-hoc manner has proven its efficacy in the case of Israel and deserves to be placed at the core of U.S. foreign policy today.
A sound U.S. foreign policy could revolve around what can be labelled “smart meddling.” To wit: Exert your leverage, do not settle intractable disputes, but try to prevent rivals from expanding their grip (the good old containment), and cause them to become entangled in their own game. In other words, become your rivals’ spoiler.
Russia’s involvement in Syria opens a window of opportunity for the United States to assume that role. Even after capturing Aleppo, it will take time for Russia to disengage militarily from the Syrian mess; and the United States does not lack in means and the necessary partners to lengthen Russia’s stay.
What is more, Vladimir Putin is fighting on two different fronts, a phenomenon that certainly gives him leverage to trade concessions, but which also enlarges the U.S. scope for maneuvering. In an op-ed posted in the Wall Street Journal, foreign-policy analyst Robert Kaplan asserts that “a robust movement of American forces permanently back to Europe may cause Mr. Putin to be more reasonable in Syria."
As regards the looming tensions in the South China Sea, U.S. smart meddling could take the form of providing logistical military support to allies in that region (possibly through an integrated command structure) and threatening to impose economic sanctions against strong-arm expansionist moves from the regional hegemon, China.
As a matter of fact, U.S. allies and partners are equipping themselves and strengthening cooperation with the purpose of resisting China’s hegemonic drive. Four countries in that region (Australia, India, Japan, and South Korea) figure alongside with China among the 15 top military spenders. Australia already has a military edge over China. Thus, if worse comes to worst, the role played by the United States would be a restricted, albeit decisive, one.
More important, Russia and China’s economies don’t have the strength required to sustain a protracted tug-of-war with U.S.-supported coalitions.
In Russia, crony capitalism coupled with current international sanctions acts as a check to its global ambitions.
As for China, several economy-related factors militate against Beijing’s capacity to successfully oppose a U.S.-supported alliance of neighbors. Firstly, bad loans imposed by the State are putting China’s financial structure, and for that matter the entire economy, on the brink of major turmoil. Secondly, China has much to lose from a collision with key trade partners (Japan, Australia, and the United States), which will not fail to resort to commercial and financial retaliation in the case of a military standoff. Last but not least, recent cuts in China’s military personnel and pension benefits have created a malaise that will not leave the army’s morale unscathed.
Turning now to non-state, terrorist actors, it can be argued that conflict-solving -- i.e. trying to destroy these actors -- may not necessarily be the most productive tack. Terrorist groups tend to mutate into crueler organizations. ISIS has been more brutal still than its predecessor, al-Qaeda, so better not to think what would come after ISIS.
This helps to understand why Efraim Inbar, Director of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies, Bar-Ilan University, contends that rather than destroying ISIS, weakening the organization would be best: “A weak but functioning Isis can undermine the appeal of the caliphate among radical Muslims; keep bad actors focused on one another; and hamper Iran’s quest for regional hegemony."
Does all this mean that current conflicts are forever intractable? Not at all. For while the game goes on, the geopolitical adventures of Russia and China will take a toll on these countries’ economies. Economic fatigue, even exhaustion, will force them to revise downward their hegemonic pretensions (as happened with the Soviet Union at the time of Gorbachev).
Then, and only then, will contending powers show a real willingness to engage in meaningful negotiations on the easing of tensions in the different arcs of crisis. Then, and only then, will conflict-solving become a workable foreign-policy option again.
