The hatchet not buried

The hatchet not buried

Instead of acknowledging that the world is multilateral, an old conflict is being reignited in Ukraine.

By Alexander Neu

[This article published on Feb 11, 2022 is translated from the German on the Internet, Das nicht begrabene Kriegsbeil.]



The conflict in and around Ukraine is not the cause of the growing tensions between the "West" and Russia and China. It is only a concrete expression of the overarching fundamental problem: the so-called European and global security order or security architecture. This actually represents a dominance behavior that is intended to permanently consolidate the dominance of the White West over the rest of the world in good old colonial tradition. Whereas in the past it was the supposed claim of "civilizing" other cultures, which, however, brought exploitation and racism with them instead, today it is values such as the Western understanding of democracy and human rights that are to be exported globally. It is obvious, however, that these values are not really at stake, but rather tangible material interests, for which the rhetoric of values is merely a moral cover.

This European security and dominance architecture was established immediately after the end of the Cold War in 1990/91, despite all the assurances of a new beginning of peaceful coexistence and a common security space in Europe in the form of the "Charter of Paris". The West, as the victor of the Cold War, did not act in a sovereign manner and with a view to achieving a balance with the "loser", but also claimed the spoils from the victory, and this is still true today. These spoils are the former Warsaw Pact states and the successor states of the USSR, which are to be integrated into the Western sphere of influence via NATO's eastward enlargement, the open-door policy, and EU enlargement or "Eastern Partnership".

With the change of ruling and functional elites in Eastern Europe, people and their successor generation came to power as decision-makers who had previously stood in fundamental opposition to the state socialist systems. These post-Cold War elites are not only staunchly anti-communist, but also strongly Russophobic. They managed to anchor their Russophobic attitudes in at least parts of their societies and elevate them to a national self-image, even a national identity marker.

In the eyes of these elites, there is no alternative to institutional accession to the West via NATO and to "Europe" in order to finally put the Yalta order of 1945 to rest. Moreover, in their eyes Russia must be pushed out of Europe, since a Europe with Russia would not be a Western Europe for these elites. And on this issue, the positions of these Eastern European elites coincide with those in the United States and some transatlantic forces in Western Europe.

Russia's decline in the 1990s

Russia was unable to oppose Western dominance in the 1990s until the beginning of the second millennium, even signing the "Charter of Paris" in the belief that the victor was actually serious about a new beginning in Europe. The goals formulated in the Charter did indeed represent a quantum leap in international politics, especially for Europe. However, it also contains contradictory statements and objectives. For example, the "Charter of Paris" states on the one hand and very decisively:

"Security is indivisible, and the security of each participating State is inseparable from that of all others."

This statement calls for at least a collective understanding of security in the CSCE/OSCE area. Even if there have been no initiatives at the time and to this day to expand this demand institutionally and structurally in the form of an actual security-collective OSCE, this statement must at least be respected to the extent that no unilateral measures are taken that represent a shared security in favor of one side and to the detriment of the other, thus leading sooner or later to the emergence of a Cold War 2.0 - including arms races and escalations such as we are currently experiencing.

The West's statement and promise to Moscow not to expand NATO was and is in line with the concept of undivided, common security.

In contrast, moreover, the following ultimately countervailing statement is found in the "Charter of Paris":

"In this context, we affirm the right of States freely to make their security policy dispositions."

Thus, the free choice of alliance in terms of security policy. Both statements are therefore contradictory, since either common security, on the one hand security collective or at least corresponding understanding, or on the other hand military alliance, which, however, means - justified in the nature of things - shared security. This contradictoriness can only be identified if one knows the contrary conceptions between security collective and military alliance, which, unfortunately, is sometimes doubtful both in political Berlin and in the capital media.

Since the "Charter of Paris" names common undivided security much more frequently when mentioning both concepts alone and also in the spirit of the document as a consequence of the 1989/91 caesura, this approach definitely has priority. Nevertheless, Western political decision-makers and the mainstream media refer almost exclusively to the free choice of alliance and in this way undercut the actual goal of the "Charter of Paris," namely the creation of an undivided common European security space.

Back to the future - Russia's demand for undivided security

Russia is no longer prepared to accept the idiosyncratic interpretation of the "Charter of Paris" as well as the Western security architecture developed from it in the sense of Western geopolitics and imperial policy:

First, because the eastward expansion of Western geopolitical constructs, such as NATO and the EU, negates Russia's legitimate security needs in its eyes in a threatening way, keyword: encirclement of Russia. And secondly, because in recent years Russia has made massive gains in political power from its military backwardness through a clever armament and reform policy of its military structures - according to the motto of quality instead of quantity - and as a result of an economic policy that, contrary to expectations, has remained stable. On the basis of this gain in power, Russia, in tandem with China, now sharply rejects the West's unilateral policy of dominance.

The two documents referred by the Russian government to the U.S. and NATO in December 2021 (1) reflect precisely these demands: Common security and not security at the expense of third countries. The concrete list of demands is actually designed for a defensive security order in Europe in the sense of the "Charter of Paris". The U.S. and NATO responses have since been published (2, 3).

The rejection of Russia's core demand - no further eastward expansion of NATO, no deployment of major weapons systems near Russia's borders and the withdrawal of NATO military infrastructure to the level of 1997 - shows that the U.S.-led NATO has no interest whatsoever in a serious understanding, a settlement with Russia and a revision of the European security architecture, which is still based on unipolarity. Russia, however, will not accept this. The mere fact of how aggressively Russia has formulated its demands and made them public does not in principle allow the Russian leadership to allow the West to talk down its core demands and to be fobbed off with secondary or tertiary concessions, such as more transparency in maneuver activities, etc. This means that further escalation is inevitable.

This means that further escalation is pre-programmed if no arrangements can be found beyond the public eye that NATO and Russia can live with without losing face. Especially since some NATO states, in particular the USA, Great Britain and Poland, are pouring gasoline on the fire by claiming that Russia wants to attack Ukraine militarily and that the entity must therefore supply Ukraine with armaments, personnel and training for legitimate self-defense purposes. After all, the point of Russia's demand is precisely that there should be no shared security, but equal and common security for all states in the OSCE area.

The Western policy of positioning Ukraine even more strongly against Russia, as British Prime Minister Boris Johnson put it during his visit to Kiev on February 1, 2022, according to which "Ukrainians will fight to the last drop of blood" (4), significantly increases the danger of an actual confrontation and does so with a longing eye, quite as if the confrontation is longed for. At the same time, the media, both public and corporate in Germany, present themselves as propaganda machines of the White House and NATO headquarters in Brussels. They do not report critically and with due distance on the conflict, but adopt the positions of the Western hardliners and intoxicate the public with war cries.

Even more, they exert massive pressure on the SPD to finally submit to the martial policy of Washington and NATO, i.e. to seriously tackle arms deliveries for Ukraine as well as to finally announce the end of Northstream 2 - no matter how high the price for Europe, not least the gas price, may be. The defense of one's own hegemonic order has its price - only the average consumer has to pay, as long as it remains only the energy price. If, however, there is a military conflict with Russia, the war-mongering editorial offices will also have to pay - depending on the military dimension.

Two different agendas - or how people deliberately talk past each other

Just how little interest the West has in reaching an understanding with Russia is shown by the fact that both sides are basically talking past each other:

While the West focuses on Ukraine as the central conflict area and updates the Russian army's invasion plan and timing on a weekly basis, Russia puts the revision of the Western hegemonic order, including NATO's eastward expansion, at the center of its demands.

Since the West, under U.S. leadership and at the insistence of some Eastern European states, refuses to demand that the European security architecture, including security guarantees, be adapted to the new power realities and based on the "Charter of Paris," it must at the same time keep the European public away from this issue, because the Russian demands are, first, not entirely outlandish and, second, publicly available. The appropriate tactic is, first, to keep the Russian demands out of the public eye, i.e., to report as few details about them as possible, or to delegitimize these demands with selective reference to the "Charter of Paris," to freedom of alliance. And secondly, to anesthetize the public with a powerful topic, Russia's allegedly planned attack on Ukraine.

Whether Russia actually intends or is considering such an attack is certainly known only by the decision-makers in Moscow - everything else is wild speculation, but claimed as fact by political and media Berlin, which has been able to catch up with the Corona issue in terms of news relevance. This diversionary tactic also has another "positive" side effect: Since Russia wants to intervene in Ukraine, as Western politicians and media never tire of asserting, and even invasion plans can be found on the Internet on the basis of maps, this proves the necessity of the existence of NATO and its continued eastward expansion as a unique peace project for Europe.

Real and climate policy, instead of war policy

A realpolitik approach, however, looks different: Back to the "Charter of Paris" in the spirit of this Charter! That means the creation of a real common security space including Russia and all post-Soviet states, instead of deepening the European division. This, however, presupposes that the West puts aside its already hypocritical moral and value-based political understanding and missionary character in favor of peaceful co-existence and close economic cooperation between the EU and the Eurasian Union and China.

Humanity is facing a huge challenge, namely the increasingly impacting climate catastrophe. Instead of playing military and geopolitical sandbox games to the delight of the arms industry and desk strategists in editorial offices and defense ministries, joint action by all European and global forces is needed to tackle this human task - also and especially with Russia as the largest territorial state and China as soon to be the world's largest economic power.

In short: Either we accept the cultural and historical plurality as well as the legitimate security interests of all states on our globe - and not only of the West - and actively support UN international law in order to at least limit the climate catastrophe through joint efforts, or we will perish together - either through the continuing climate catastrophe or, in terms of time, even earlier through a war that first starts in Europe or Southeast Asia.

Sources and Notes:

(1) "Treaty between The United States of America and the Russian Federation on securtity guarantees," 17 Dec. 2022: https://mid.ru/ru/foreign_policy/rso/nato/1790818/?lang=en

"Agreement on measures to ensure the security of the Russian Federation and member States of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization": https://mid.ru/ru/foreign_policy/rso/nato/1790803/?lang=en&clear_cache=Y

(2) https://elpais.com/infografias/2022/02/respuesta_otan/respuesta_otan_eeuu.pdf

(3) https://img.rt.com/deutsch/docs/2022.02/original/61faea2048fbef18494ce32a/NATO-Antwort+on+Russian+demands+%28german+version%29.pdf.

(4) Press conference in Kiev with Volodymyr Selenskyi and Boris Johnson.

Alexander S. Neu, born in 1969, holds a doctorate in political science. He gained practical political experience as a staff member of the OSCE in the former Yugoslavia. Since 2013, he has been a member of the Left Party's parliamentary group in the Bundestag and its representative on the Defense Committee. Previously, he was the parliamentary group's security policy officer for seven years.