Cast a stone into the water and watch the ripples spread. Russia's incursion into Georgia is such an event. Georgia just got stoned, and we will feel the ripples. It is not just Georgia that is profoundly affected by this event. It's not even the Ukraine, and Belorussia, and Finland, and Estonia and Lithuania, and Kazakhstan, and Uzbekistan, and all the other 'stans which are the remnants of the old Soviet empire. It's not even Poland which just signed a treaty to allow us to deploy anti ballistic missiles on its soil, and received a threat of nuclear attack from the Russian high command in response.
Indeed, Russia's real target, its ultimate target is western Europe. And its weapon of choice will not be the armored divisions that we defended against for forty years; it will be gas and oil. Russia will endeavor to bend Europe, old and new, to its will without firing a shot. It will rely on Europe's heavy dependence on its energy. It will rely on Europe's weak will to confront the challenge head-on. It will rely on the inability of the US to offer anything beyond empty rhetoric, as Mr. McCain is currently doing, because we have little capacity to do more. It will not need to role into the Ukraine next month to further exert its influence. It will simply need to continue camping out in Georgia, and sending regular postcards to its neighbors. Which brings us to an interesting truth that we seem to have forgotten, if in fact our society has ever really understood it.
It is not the military which makes a society strong. It is the society's resource base which makes the society strong, including its military. That resource base includes natural resources, infrastructure, knowledge resources, financial resources, and human resources. We are now facing severe constraints, mostly self-imposed by our own cultural and civic stupidity, in all of those categories for a variety of reasons that would require a book to catalog - not a blog. But the net result is that our military is not the defensive shield we would like to think it is; not for us, certainly not for western Europe, and not for Georgia. But that's not necessarily the problem we think it is, if we choose to approach the Georgian situation with uncharacteristic enlightenment. Let's consider a hypothetical example:
When Maggie Thatcher sent the British Navy to reclaim the Falkland Islands, she may have missed a golden opportunity to change the course of human history. Instead of sending the British navy, at a considerable loss of life, to make a symbolic point of Britain's power, consider what might have happened if she had done a 'Bush 41' and convened an economic alliance to blockade Argentina economically and bring it to its knees. That could have set a precedent of lasting benefit to mankind, if not for the military-industrial complex. But Maggie instead succumbed to the need to demonstrate her testicular fortitude and demonstrate that she could play the man's game on men's terms and win...nothing. I suspect that if Hillary were to become Commander in Chief, she would do the same.
But that was then and this is now, and innocent Georgians are suffering as we debate philosophy, as Croatians and Bosnians and Kosovians, and Darfurians and so many others have. We cannot stop that immediate suffering. Symbolic actions and empty mutterings will not reverse the course or melt the resolve of thuggish warlords. That truth is beyond dispute, if beyond the grasp of some of our would-be leaders. So, what to do?
As difficult as the challenge will be, the strongest course available to us at this time is a course that 'old warriors' will dismiss as weak, even though their vision has been too impaired by the
mist of past and possible 'glory' to realize that their tanks are rusting and their jets are wearing out.
We must begin to exercise the economic and political levers at our disposal to bring united pressure to bear in isolating the Russians and rejecting their use of economic blackmail. We must begin to do this now, difficult and untenable as it may seem, because there will be no better time, and it will become increasingly impossible to do this as the global energy dilemma deepens, and it will.
We must keep the channels of dialog open to the Russian autocracy, and equally to the Russian people, as we tighten the economic resistance to Russia's military and economic aggression.
We must build a Coalition of the Committed capable of exercising the collective economic and political power that we cannot exercise alone. Some will say that such strategies have never worked in the past. But such strategies have rarely, if ever, been effectively enforced. To say that it has not been done is not to prove its impossibility.
We in the US must dust off and re-burnish our principles, and our professed values, and demonstrate again our national capacity for sacrifice and loyalty if we are to hope to convince the other democracies that they and we can unite to turn back the darkness by means that do not perpetuate it.
Finally, recognizing that this strategy will not likely fall on receptive ears in Europe, we must prepare to demonstrate our preparedness to stand alone if they will not stand together. This raises an interesting dilemma. Since the Europeans are more energy efficient than we, but still vulnerable to Russian energy blackmail, it becomes a dilemma to contemplate what it will take for us to achieve anything remotely approaching energy independence in the intermediate term of five to ten years. But clearly, we must begin immediately to demonstrate our commitment to that goal, and back that up with concerted action. The energy crisis IS the moral equivalent of war. If we do not win this moral war, we cannot win a military one.
Can an economic / political strategy succeed in the face of a barrel of a tank cannon? Yes, if we remember a few truths from the Cold War. We learned belatedly that the Soviets were not nearly as strong as we thought they were. Their economy was hollow, their people demoralized, their leadership old and brittle. We did not need to confront them with a 600 ship navy. We could have done more lasting damage, and more lasting good by forcing the Soviet's into an economic and political competition for the non-aligned world that they could not possibly have won, while our military might continued to hold them in check. We can still do that. It will take a generation - half the time of the cold war.
This does not argue for ignoring our military. It must be as strong as ever. It must remain the credible Last Resort. But it must have real strength. Not glitzy toys but capable warriors, adequately provisioned with reliable and relevant tools of the trade, and led by competent and ethical leaders who are as brave in the face of their President as we hope they will be in the face of an enemy. At this time, we have only capable warriors, not enough and largely spent.
There is one other reason to believe that the Russian leadership can be 'discouraged' from its thuggish behaviors. It may be as brutish in its world view as our current leadership is dull in its, but the Russian leadership is by no means stupid. It faces a reality on its southeastern flank that it cannot ignore: 1.3 billion resource-starved Chinese who are permeating its border at an accelerating rate. By comparison, our concern about our southern border is quite benign. If the West chooses to insulate itself from Russian energy blackmail, it also threatens the illusion of Russian economic prosperity and ultimately Russian military capability. Of course, the Bear can always sell all the resources it wants to the Dragon. But then it will be captive of the Dragon.
This will not be a war of weapons, but a war of wills. We cannot send proxies out to fight this one for us. The question is -- do we have the courage and resolve to prevail on this battlefield of values?
Onward.
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