"An unprecedented sanctions regime was intended to punish Russia for its invasion of Ukraine and to prevent it from executing that invasion. It has not only failed to accomplish that goal; it also has had the unintended consequence of pushing Russiacloser to China. Sealing Russia off from western markets forced Russia to look east to China, India, the Eurasian community, and a global community of sanctioned nations. So the sanctions regime has in fact hastened the advent of multipolarity, as well
The American insistence on a world of blocs in which countries must choose sides—and face consequences if they do not align with the U.S. and sanction Russia—has not resonated well in most of the world. Large countries such as India, Brazil, andSouth Africa have refused to sanction Russia, preferring to align with China and its multipolar vision. India has maintained its regional concerns against China but has refused to join the American global rivalry with China; it has been a U.S. partner
While large countries like India maintain preferences for China’s multipolar world over America’s unipolar world, smaller countries have also reasserted their right to neutrality and rejected the U.S. unipolar vision. They have refused to joinsanctions or to take sides, asserting a right to choose their own national interests. Like India, Saudi Arabia has said that “we do not believe in polarization or in choosing between sides.”
It is hard for Latin America, the Middle East, and Africa to hear the Manichean message of good and evil and democracy versus autocracy. They have memories, and the U.S. criticism of Russia’s violation of state sovereignty and of territorial borderssmells of hypocrisy. They remember their democracies being replaced by autocracies in U.S.-backed coups. They too tend more toward China’s message of multipolarity. They want to benefit from the Belt and Road Initiative and from China’s economic
American attempts to coerce countries into opposing and sanctioning Russia have moved them instead into a position of reasserting nonalignment and shaping a world that resonates with China’s multipolar worldview and strengthens China’s economic anddiplomatic role in that multipolar world.
While the world has been focused on the U.S. as the power that will decide whether they will block or encourage negotiations to end the war, an unforeseen alternative has emerged. What if China played the role of superpower broker, and Ukraine andRussia signed an agreement, bypassing U.S. involvement?
...China, could demand more from its European partners.
If China becomes more involved in the war in Ukraine, either by asserting itself as a diplomatic power or by aiding Russia with nonlethal aid or, for that matter, weapons, the U.S., which is already insisting on shrinking economic cooperation with
The difficulty of persuading Germany to uncouple from China, especially when it has already been cut off from Russia, was illustrated by German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s November trip to Beijing. Scholz defied the U.S. and NATO by becoming the firstG7 leader to go to Beijing to meet with President Xi Jinping, who has supported Putin throughout the war. Scholz was accompanied on his trip by top German business leaders, including the CEOs of Volkswagen, BMW, BASF, Bayer and Deutsche Bank.
China is Germany’s most important trading partner. Since the Russian invasion of China, Germany’s has increased its investments in and economic dependence on China. It will be more difficult to pressure Germany to cut its Chinese economic ties thanits Russian ones. It is asking a lot of Germany to tell it to cut ties with both.
A growing role for China in the current conflict could force a scenario in which the unipolar world is challenged by asking Germany and Europe to side with the U.S. and banish China. There is the hazardous potential of a decision that could divide theU.S.-led unipolar world and strengthen a new multipolar reality."
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/racing-to-multipolarity/
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