The noise and drama surrounding Putin, Russia and the Ukraine obscure crucial foreign policy principles. In “Lord Salisbury’s Lessons for Great Powers”, Robert Merry takes a closer look at what they might be.
First, avoid promiscuous jingoism of the kind that Salisbury despised—and that suffuses so much American commentary and political discourse today. This kind of talk, particularly coming from national leaders, ultimately undermines any nation’s global authority.
Once embarked upon, this pernicious habit is hard to turn off. Combative political and media constituencies thrive on such melodrama and prudent voices find it ever more difficult to be heard, much less listened to.
Second, avoid geopolitical controversies and crises that don’t affect directly the nation’s true strategic interests. A corollary principle is to avoid moralistic posturing, which only breeds national hypocrisy and leads inevitably to geopolitical overextension.
As Merry points out, “any hegemonic power inevitably will encounter multiple challenges at any given time, and hence it must assess carefully, in terms of its fundamental interests, the clashes it wishes to pursue.” To do otherwise is to court eventual exhaustion and ridicule. Moralistic posturing is really only a subset of the sort of “promiscuous jingoism” covered in the first point.
Third, never lose sight of Machiavelli’s balance-of-interests concept. When a global power tampers with another major country’s traditional sphere of influence, the result will be a breakdown in the ability of those two countries to deal with each other effectively.
It’s here, of course, where the US and Europe have miscalculated badly. Or, perhaps, not really calculated at all. The Ukraine is a vital strategic interest for Russia, whether we like it or not, and any actions (or indeed comments) should take that reality into account.
Fourth, never lose sight of the fundamental reality that stability is derived through a balance of power, not through hegemony. The former can be maintained through creative diplomacy backed up through a strong military presence; the latter is inherently unstable because it angers and energizes the Lilliputians.
Self-evident, one would have thought, but that ignores the temptations of power. In the wake of the Soviet collapse, America was incomparably more powerful than any potential rival and, perhaps more importantly, saw itself as morally superior, fit to command and control a world in desperate need of both its power and beneficence.
There was much truth in all this; regrettably, whatever sense of prudence and objectivity remained in those halcyon years was swept away by 9/11. Now all of us have to live with the consequences.
Murray Rothbard in the 1980 Afghan context quoted Canon Sydney Smith – a great classical liberal in early nineteenth century England who wrote to his warmongering Prime Minister thus:
Lovely quote, Jim.
I love the bar fight analogy for the start of wars. No one can back down.
No-one could back down in 1914. Tom Schelling even said that once a country mobilised for war in 1914, it had no plan at hand on how to stop the mobilisation.
In Schelling view, many wars including World War 1 were products of mutual alarm and unpredictable tests of will.
When people discuss the futility of World War 1, they under rate the role of unintended consequences and the dark side of human rationality in situations involving collective action as explained by David Friedman:
It is even harder to get out of a war than into one.
The problem is credible assurances that the peace is lasting rather than just a chance for the other side to rebuild and come back to attack from a stronger position. That is why the peace treaty in 1919 totally disarmed Germany and split-up the other Axis powers.
An understudied issue is peace feelers in World War 1 such as by the German chancellor in 1916 and the Reichstag peace resolution on 19 July 1917. Pope Benedict XV tried to mediate with his Peace Note of August 1917.
I love the rational irrationality story. Very true, and it goes for many circumstances (basically a tradeoff between the occasions where there is a surplus to be divided and being irrational means you get more, versus the occasions where the surplus gets destroyed, or worse). Sounds like the kind of argument someone probably has written a famous economics paper about.
thanks Paul, how can something better off be irrational? looking tough saved you from plenty of earlier fights and being picked on.
with your indulgence, and at the risk of self-promotion, see http://utopiayouarestandinginit.wordpress.com/2014/03/18/trade-is-a-powerful-force-for-peace-in-the-ukraine/
Ingolf, I forget to say thanks.
Pleasure Jim. The sub thread is going to get way too skinny so I’ll start afresh.
Yes, great analogy. Let’s hope cool objectivity remains a partner in whatever deliberations are to come. I think Putin and Lavrov lean that way but these matters are of visceral importance to them so who can say what will happen if the west pushes too hard. God willing they won’t.
There are some hopeful signs. After another phone conversation, Lavrov and Kerry have apparently agreed to seek a solution to the crisis by “pushing for constitutional reforms [in Ukraine]”.
Moon of Alabama has some thoughts on the origins and nature of this initiative. Good discussion at Sic Semper Tyrannis too.
If you read Machiavelli, he said the opposite… eventually you get forced to pick a side, so be ready to pick a side early when you can still control the outcome, and make bloody sure you end up on the winning side so you can roll with the winners.
Don’t wait until afterwards, if you do that you get no control over the outcome and effectively you negotiate with someone strong and independent who gives you no respect.
In the case of the Crimea, it’s all over, the outcome is settled. The EU have been caught flat footed and the USA is no longer the World Police. Where we go from here is another question. I find it difficult to believe that Vlad Putin will go barging into any country that is well equipped and willing to defend itself. In the Crimea probably there are enough locals who prefer Russia to the EU that the outcome was never in doubt.
Tel,
On your latter points, agreed, although I don’t share your confidence that the US will be stepping back any time soon.
On the first, I see it differently. Hegemons don’t really need to pick sides; that’s a problem for other, weaker nations. By definition, at least for the moment, they are the winning side. They can afford to be standoffish about minor matters, indeed doing so merely adds to their aura. When they do intervene, however, it needs to be definitive.
You might choose to see the US right now as following the bipartisan policy of recent decades: talk loud but without any intent to reverse the events which have already happened. The loud talk keeps the domestic audience somewhat happy (though if you’re a Democrat, the hawks will still squeak), and signals to the antagonist what you really value.
What did Carter do about the Afghanistan invasion? He condemned it, ordered a grain embargo and an Olympics boycott, and sent carriers to the Persian Gulf, demonstrating to the Russians what the US really cared about. (He also upped support to the Mujahadeen, results of which have been, um … interesting.) What did Reagan do in the Polish government’s Solidarity crack-down? He loudly condemned it and ordered economic sanctions, which clearly lifted morale in the union but whose economic impact is less certain.. What did Reagan do about the Beirut barracks bombing? He pledged to keep a military force in Lebanon – and within a year pulled out every marine in the country. What did George W. Bush do when the Soviets went into Georgia? He had Dick Cheney declare Russia’s invasion “must not go unanswered”, and then let it go unanswered, eloquently displaying the US’s very real non-interest in the fate of South Ossetia.
Obama’s rhetoric seems to me to fall within that tradition. His goals are likely to stave off a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, while making it clear to Putin that Poland and the Gulf states are out of bounds. It doesn’t seem likely to me that he has any intention of going to war with Russia over Ukraine. (There were, of course, plenty of armchair geniuses writing much the same thing in August 1914.) Merry seems to think Obama’s rhetoric is signalling something more, but I’m not sure he’s really made the case.
You’re almost certainly right about Obama’s intentions but I didn’t get the impression Merry was suggesting anything else. What makes you think he was?
As for America’s policy, one of the differences this time is they were so clearly complicit in creating the crisis in the first place. That makes walking away a trickier business, both strategically and politically.
Like you, I still think they will but the risk of unintended escalation is probably higher than usual. There’s a lot of face involved and America’s escalating obsession with Russia handicaps rational policy-making.
It was Merry’s last sentence that made me think he was suggesting Obama was willing to go further than Carter, Regan and Bush. The negative consequences of similar rhetoric from Reagan, Carter and Bush were not terribly substantial, and they may have done some good by warning the various antagonists against going further in the wrong direction. My view is that Obama is right in line with his predecessors, although the game is probably riskier than they think.
The lesson of 1914 is that not that these situations generally end badly, but that they can end catastrophically on the occasions where they do depart from the script.
It’s what Nick Gruen says about trade deficits: They’re not a problem, and still not a problem – and then one day they’re your only problem.
Sure, I can see that. My take was that he sees a lot of damage as already done with the full bill still to be presented.
The bombing of the barracks in Beirut was a real turning point in the perception the islamists had or rather thought they understood about the US.
First Carter , then Reagan helped them and they were emboldened.
Fast forward 30 years and we have the other thread with Thomas Friedman trying to explain what blood and treasure means to the US and why they HAD to go into Iraq.