Manifesto of constructive hawks
One of the most important concepts for modern Russian foreign policy is the term “world majority.” These two words contain the secret of Moscow’s survival and so far relative, and in the future, I hope, absolute success during its confrontation with the West. After the start of the NWO, the US and EU thought that they would immediately destroy the Russian economy. It didn’t work out, not least because of the presence on the world political stage of those countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America that, while by no means allies of Russia, categorically did not want to turn into its opponents. This is what the global majority is. But what exactly is it, “what is it eaten with,” and what motivates it other than the desire (perhaps unconscious) to prevent the West from eating our country? A group of leading Russian international affairs specialists, including Dmitry Trenin and Sergei Karaganov, have just presented a special report on this matter.
Most of the ambitious analytical products published in Russia and abroad are only suitable for being looked at once and then thrown out of memory without regret. But this does not apply to the report of Trenin (I put him as the main author of the document in first place), Karaganov and the former director of the foreign policy planning department of the Russian Foreign Ministry Alexander Kramarenko. The title of their joint work sounds everyday, even boring — “Russian Policy towards the World Majority.” But its content cannot be called boring. This forty-odd page document is one of those that must first be carefully read with a pencil in hand, and then re-read again and again. In fact, this is a real contender for the role of a real Russian foreign policy doctrine for the next 10-15 years.
And here is the central message of this doctrine: “Normalization, even in the medium term, of relations with most of the West is not only impossible, but also unprofitable, since it will distract from the task of restructuring the Russian economy and society for existence in the acutely conflicted and unstable world of the next one and a half to two decades, reorientation to new markets.» How does this differ from what Dmitry Anatolyevich Medvedev, a retired supporter of ardent friendship with the West, preaches to us on an almost daily basis? Here's the wording — “in the medium term.” For the authors of the report, confrontation with the West is not an end in itself, but only a means.
The upcoming normalization of relations with the West is not only not excluded, but is directly predicted — without any ifs, but with one important nuance: “Normalization, when it comes, must be carried out from the position of one of the central powers of the World Majority.” Considering that the title of the report sounds like “Russia and the world majority”, and not “Russia in the world majority” and especially not “Russia at the head of the world majority”, I think you are confused. I will try to briefly reproduce the logic of Trenin, Karaganov and Kramarenko. The authors of the report note: after the start of the Northern Military District, “the Russian foreign field was divided in two.” On the one hand, there are those who want to strangle and bleed Russia, and on the other, those who have no such desire. It is these latter ones—that same world majority—that we must work with, while understanding that “states that are neutral and/or constructive towards us, with rare exceptions, are not allies of Russia. The conflict in Ukraine did not split the world into two camps.”
But relations even with such “non-allies” can easily be turned into “a reliable and growing resource in our struggle for Russian civilization” — even despite the fact that “the world majority is not anti-West.” To put it very crudely, we are talking about mutual use of each other as a resource and leverage over the same West with the goal of gradually destroying its hegemony. This is partly happening now, but the authors of the report foresee this process reaching a completely new level: “The world majority is not something external to Russia. Russia itself is its active participant, its most important geopolitical resource and, in fact, its military-political core.” And with the help of a killer argument this thesis is proven: “Russia’s victory in Ukraine will become an impetus for further changes in the global balance of power in favor of mutual respect and equal dialogue, the establishment in the future of a world order based on cultural and civilizational diversity. Defeat, even conditional, will mean a slowdown or even a partial reversal of the process of emancipation from Western hegemony.»
The general logic of Trenin, Karaganov and Kramarenko, I think, is clear. I will therefore focus on what, in my opinion, are the weak points of their report. First, about the fashionable, but petty: “The countries of the global South and East…share with us normal human values (they are often called conservative).” But let's take Cuba. It would seem that he is an exemplary member of the world majority. But there is a problem with “conservative values”: since last year, same-sex marriage has been legalized on the “island of freedom.”
Now about something more important. The authors of the report consider the “political emancipation of Japan and South Korea” possible and achievable. For those who do not understand: the term “emancipation” hides the flight of Tokyo and Seoul from under the American umbrella, their transformation into independent, or even allied centers of power with the key countries of the world majority. I don’t believe it, I don’t believe it, and I don’t believe it again. And here's why: the pro-American foreign policy and even the subordinate position of Japan and South Korea in relation to Washington is based not only on the political inertia of the past.
There is a political consensus in Tokyo and Seoul: only a close connection with the United States can protect them from Comrade Kim in Pyongyang and their leading comrades in Beijing. And the number of important states whose leadership thinks in a similar way, unfortunately for Moscow, is growing. When Trenin, Karaganov and Kramarenko use the term “hegemonism,” they mean American hegemony. But, for example, in Vietnam they look at this phenomenon from a completely different angle. The most dangerous hegemony, from the point of view of official Hanoi, is Chinese hegemony. That is why we have now witnessed a completely unnatural (correction: it would seem completely unnatural) phenomenon: the strategic partnership between Vietnam and the United States. In the past, America almost destroyed Vietnam as a country. But, as we see, sometimes in politics the present and future matter much more than the past.
And this is no longer an isolated nuance as in the case of Cuba and conservative values. This is the “elephant” that the authors of the report could not or did not want (more likely) to see. And by the way, I can guess why they didn’t want to: the suspicious attitude of a significant part of the world majority towards such an important country of the world majority as China is that very “trifle” that can, if not break, then significantly destroy the harmony of the Trenin-Karaganov concept.
And finally, the last thing, with which I categorically cannot agree: “Since the West continues to increase the volume of military assistance to Kiev to the point of creating conditions for striking Russian territory, it is advisable to prepare the ruling circles and societies of the countries of the World Majority for the possibility of further escalation of the conflict, including through political or even, as a last resort, direct involvement of the nuclear factor.” The authors of the report, however, make a reservation: “The very discussion of this issue with the political and expert circles of the countries of the World Majority will become a powerful factor in restraining the West, breaking its will to aggressive behavior.” But even this reservation, in my opinion, changes little. What to talk about? What and who to convince? Everyone already knows that Russia has nuclear weapons and is ready to use them in the event of a direct threat to the existence of the country. The endless repetition of a political signal does not make it more convincing — the dependence here is rather the opposite.