Eurasia

For most of the second half of the twentieth century, the Soviet Union controlled Eurasia—from central Germany to the Pacific, as far south as the Caucasus and the Hindu Kush. When the Soviet Union collapsed, its western frontier moved east nearly a thousand miles, from the West German border to the Russian border with Belarus. From the Hindu Kush its border moved northward a thousand miles to the Russian border with Kazakhstan. Russia was pushed from the border of Turkey northward to the northern Caucasus, where it is still struggling to keep its foothold in the region. Russian power has now retreated farther east than it has been in centuries. During the Cold War it had moved farther west than ever before. In the coming decades, Russian power will settle somewhere between those two lines.

After the Soviet Union dissolved at the end of the twentieth century, foreign powers moved in to take advantage of Russia’s economy, creating an era of chaos and poverty. They also moved rapidly to integrate as much as they could of the Russian empire into their own spheres of influence. Eastern Europe was absorbed into NATO and the EU, and the Baltic states were also absorbed into NATO. The United States entered into a close relationship with both Georgia in the Caucasus and with many of the Central Asian “stans,” particularly after September 11, when the Russians allowed U.S. forces into the area to wage the war in Afghanistan. Most significantly, Ukraine moved into an alignment with the United States and away from Russia—this was a breaking point in Russian history.

The Orange Revolution in Ukraine, from December 2004 to January 2005, was the moment when the post–Cold War world genuinely ended for Russia. The Russians saw the events in Ukraine as an attempt by the United States to draw Ukraine into NATO and thereby set the stage for Russian disintegration. Quite frankly, there was some truth to the Russian perception.

If the West had succeeded in dominating Ukraine, Russia would have become indefensible. The southern border with Belarus, as well as the southwestern frontier of Russia, would have been wide open. In addition, the distance between Ukraine and western Kazakhstan is only about four hundred miles, and that is the gap through which Russia has been able to project power toward the Caucasus (see map, page 71). We should assume, then, that under these circumstances Russia would have lost its ability to control the Caucasus and would have had to retreat farther north from Chechnya. The Russians would have been abandoning parts of the Russian Federation itself, and Russia’s own southern flank would become highly vul- nerable. Russia would have continued to fragment until it returned to its medieval frontiers. Had Russia fragmented to this extent, it would have created chaos in Eurasia—to which the United States would not have objected, since the U.S. grand strategy has always aimed for the fragmentation of Eurasia as the first line of defense for U.S. control of the seas, as we have seen. So the United States had every reason to encourage this process; Russia had every reason to block it. After what Russia regarded as an American attempt to further damage it, Moscow reverted to a strategy of reasserting its sphere of influence in the ar- eas of the former Soviet Union. The great retreat of Russian power ended in the new fault lines71 RUSSIA KAZAKHSTAN UZBEKISTAN TURKMENISTAN A ZERBAIJAN A IA RMENGEORGIA UKRAINE MOLDOVA BELARUS LITHUANIA LATVIA ESTONIA Moscow St. Petersburg KYRGYZSTAN TAJIKISTAN AZERBAIJAN Successor States to Soviet Union Soviet Allies Successor States to the Soviet Union Ukraine. Russian influence is now increasing in three directions: toward Cen- tral Asia, toward the Caucasus, and, inevitably, toward the West, the Baltics, and Eastern Europe. For the next generation, until roughly 2020, Russia’s primary concern will be reconstructing the Russian state and reasserting Russian power in the region. Interestingly, the geopolitical shift is aligning with an economic shift. Vladimir Putin sees Russia less as an industrial power than as an exporter of raw materials, the most important of which is energy (particularly natural gas). Moving to bring the energy industry under state supervision, if not direct con- trol, he is forcing out foreign interests and reorienting the industry toward ex- ports, particularly to Europe. High energy prices have helped stabilize Russia’s 72the next 100 years MOLDOVA LITHUANIA LATVIA ESTONIA RUSSIA SWEDEN FINLAND UKRAINE ROMANIA BULGARIA TURKEY POLAND GEORGIA Black Sea Kiev Moscow Minsk Volgograd KAZAKHSTAN Ukraine’s Strategic Significance 73 the n ew f au lt l i n e s

economy internally. But he will not confine his efforts to energy alone. He also is seeking to capitalize on Russian agriculture, timber, gold, diamonds, and other commodities. He is transforming Russia from an impoverished disaster into a poor but more productive country. Putin also is giving Russia the tool with which to intimidate Europe: the valve on a natural gas pipeline.

Russia is pressing back along its frontiers. It is deeply focused on Central Asia and will over time find success there, but Russia will have a more difficult time in the even more crucial Caucasus. The Russians do not intend to allow any part of the Russian Federation to break away. As a result, there will be friction, particularly in the next decade, with the United States and other countries in the region as Russia reasserts itself.

But the real flash point, in all likelihood, will be on Russia’s western frontier. Belarus will align itself with Russia. Of all the countries in the former Soviet Union, Belarus has had the fewest economic and political reforms and has been the most interested in re-creating some successor to the Soviet Union. Linked in some way to Russia, Belarus will bring Russian power back to the borders of the former Soviet Union.

From the Baltics south to the Romanian border there is a region where borders have historically been uncertain and conflict frequent. In the north, there is a long, narrow plain, stretching from the Pyrenees to St. Petersburg. This is where Europe’s greatest wars were fought. This is the path that Napoleon and Hitler took to invade Russia. There are few natural barriers. Therefore, the Russians must push their border west as far as possible to create a buffer. After World War II, they drove into the center of Germany on this plain. Today, they have retreated to the east. They have to return, and move as far west as possible. That means the Baltic states and Poland are, as before, problems Russia has to solve.

Defining the limits of Russian influence will be controversial. The United States—and the countries within the old Soviet sphere—will not want Russia to go too far. The last thing the Baltic states want is to fall under Russian domination again. Neither do the states south of the northern European plain, in the Carpathians. The former Soviet satellites—particularly Poland, Hungary, and Romania—understand that the return of Rus sian forces to their frontiers would represent a threat to their security. And since these countries are now part of NATO, their interests necessarily affect 74 t h e n e x t 1 0 0 yea r s

the interests of Europe and the United States. The open question is where the line will be drawn in the west. This has been a historical question, and it was a key challenge in Europe over the past hundred years.

Russia will not become a global power in the next decade, but it has no choice but to become a major regional power. And that means it will clash with Europe. The Russian–European frontier remains a fault line.

europe

Europe is still in the process of reorganizing itself after the loss of its empire and two devastating world wars, and it remains to be seen whether that reorganization will be peaceful. Europe is not going to regain its empire, but the complacent certainty that intra- European wars have ended needs to be examined. Central to this is the question of whether Europe is a spent volcano or whether it is merely dormant. The European Union has a total GDP of over $14 trillion, a trillion more than the United States. It is possible that a region of such wealth—and of such diversity in wealth—will remain immune from conflict, but it is not guaranteed.

It is unreasonable to talk of Europe as if it were one entity. It is not, in spite of the existence of the European Union. Europe consists of a series of sovereign and contentious nation- states. There is a general entity called Europe, but it is more reasonable to think of four Europes (we exclude Russia and the nations of the former Soviet Union from this list—although geographically European, these have a very different dynamic from that of Europe):

• Atlantic Europe: the nations that front the Atlantic Ocean and North Sea directly and that were the major imperial powers during the past five hundred years.

• Central Europe: essentially Germany and Italy, which did not come into existence until the late nineteenth century as modern nation-states. It was their assertion of national interest that led to the two world wars of the twentieth century.

• Eastern Europe: the nations running from the Baltic to the Black Sea

that were occupied by Soviet troops in World War II and developed their recent national identities from this experience. • There is, of course, a fourth less significant Europe, the Scandinavian countries. In the first half of the twentieth century, Atlantic Europe was the impe- rial heart of the world. Central Europeans were later comers and chal- lengers. Eastern Europeans were the victims. Torn apart by two world wars, Europe faced a fundamental question: What was the status of Germany in the European system? The Germans, frozen out of the imperial system cre- ated by Atlantic Europe, sought to overturn that system and assert their the new fault lines75 tlantic ATUGAL PORIRELAND WEDEN SNORWAY OSNIA AND BERZEGOVINA HNTENEGRO MOERBIA SCROATIA BANIA ALBULGARIA OMANIA RSLOVAKIA POLAND NITED UINGDOM KRANCE FHE TNETHERLANDS BELGIUM ENMARK DSPAIN Ocean FINLAND GERMANY SWITZERLAND ITALY SLOVENIA MACEDONIA HUNGARY AUSTRIA CZECH REPUBLIC Atlantic Europe Central Europe Eastern Europe Scandinavian Europe Four Europes 76 t h e n e x t 1 0 0 yea r s

dominance. The conclusion of World War II found Germany shattered, divided and occupied, controlled by Soviets in the east, and England, France, and the United States in the west.

West Germany was indispensable to the United States and its NATO alliance because of the confrontation with the Soviets. Creating a German army, obviously, posed a problem. If the origins of the two world wars were in the growth of German power, and Germany was encouraged to be powerful again, what was to prevent a third European war? The answer rested in the integration of the German army into NATO—essentially putting it under American command in the field. But the broader answer lay in the integration of Germany into Europe as a whole.

During the 1950s, when NATO was created, the European Economic Community was also conceived. The European Union, which emerged from it, is a schizophrenic entity. Its primary purpose is the creation of an integrated European economy, while leaving sovereignty in the hands of individual nations. Simultaneously, it is seen as the preface to a federation of European countries, in which a central European government, with a parliament and professional civil service, would govern a federal Europe where national sovereignty was limited to local matters, and defense and foreign policy rested with the whole.

Europe has not achieved this goal. It has created a free- trade zone and a European currency, which some members of the free- trade zone use and others do not. It has failed to create a political constitution, however, leaving individual nations sovereign—and therefore never has produced a united defense or foreign policy. Defense policy, to the extent it is coordinated, is in the hands of NATO, and not all members of NATO are members of the EU (notably the United States). With the collapse of the Soviet empire, individual countries in Eastern Europe were admitted to the EU and NATO.

In short, post–Cold War Europe is in benign chaos. It is impossible to unravel the extraordinarily complex and ambiguous institutional relationships that have been created. Given the history of Europe, such confusion would normally lead to war. But Europe, excepting the former Yugoslavia, has no energy for war, no appetite for instability, and certainly no desire for conflict. Europe’s psychological transformation has been extraordinary. 77 the n ew f au lt l i n e s

Where, prior to 1945, slaughter and warfare had been regular pastimes for centuries, after 1945 even the conceptual chaos of European institutions could not generate conflict beyond rhetoric.

Underneath the surface of the EU, the old European nationalisms continue to assert themselves, albeit sluggishly. This can be seen in economic negotiations within the EU. The French, for example, assert the right to protect their farmers from excessive competition, or the right not to honor treaties controlling their deficits. Therefore, in a geopolitical context, Europe has not become a unified transnational entity.

For these reasons, talking of Europe as if it were a single entity like the United States, or China, is illusory. It is a collection of nation- states, still shell- shocked by World War II, the Cold War, and the loss of empire. These nation- states are highly insular and determine their geopolitical actions according to their individual interests. Primary interactions are not between Europe and the rest of the world, but among European nations. In this sense, Europe behaves far more like Latin America than like a great power. In Latin America, Brazil and Argentina spend a great deal of time thinking about each other, knowing that their effect on the globe is limited.

Russia is the immediate strategic threat to Europe. Russia is interested not in conquering Europe, but in reasserting its control over the former Soviet Union. From the Russian point of view, this is both a reasonable attempt to establish some minimal sphere of influence and essentially a defensive measure. However, it is a defensive measure that will immediately affect the three Baltic states, which are now integrated into European institutions.

Obviously the Eastern Europeans want to prevent a Russian resurgence. The real question is what the rest of Europe might do—and especially, what Germany might do. The Germans are now in a comfortable position with a buffer between them and the Russians, free to focus on their internal economic and social problems. In addition, the heritage of World War II weighs heavily on the Germans. They will not want to act alone, but as part of a unified Europe.

Germany’s position is unpredictable. It is a nation that has learned, given its geopolitical position, that it is enormously dangerous to assert its national interest. In 1914 and 1939, Germany attempted to act decisively in 78 t h e n e x t 1 0 0 yea r s

response to geopolitical threats, and each time its efforts ended catastrophically. The German analysis is that engaging in politico- military maneuvers outside of a broad coalition exposes Germany to tremendous danger. Atlantic Europe sees Germany as a buffer against Russia and will see any threat in the Baltics as being irrelevant to their interests. Therefore, they will not join the coalition Germany needs to face the Russians. So the most likely outcome will be German inaction, limited American involvement, and a gradual return of Russian power into the borderland between Europe and Russia.

But there is another scenario. In this scenario Germany will recognize the imminent danger to Poland in Russian domination of the Baltics. Seeing Poland as a necessary part of German national security, it will thus exercise a forward policy, designed to protect Poland by protecting the Baltics. Germany will move to dominate the Baltic basin. Since the Russians will not simply abandon the field, the Germans will find themselves in an extended confrontation with the Russians, competing for influence in Poland and in the Carpathian region.

Germany will find itself, of necessity, both split off from its aggressive past and from the rest of Europe. While the rest of Europe will try to avoid involvement, the Germans will be engaged in traditional power politics. As they do that, their effective as well as potential power will soar and their psychology will shift. Suddenly, a united Germany will be asserting itself again. What starts defensively will evolve in unexpected ways.

This is not the most likely scenario. However, the situation might galvanize Germany back into its traditional role of looking at Russia as a major threat, and looking at Poland and the rest of Eastern Europe as a part of its sphere of influence and as protection against the Russians. This depends partly on how aggressively the Russians move, how tenaciously the Balts resist, how much risk the Poles are willing to take, and how distant the United States intends to be. Finally, it depends on internal German politics.

Internally, Europe is inert, still in shock over its losses. But external forces such as Islamic immigration or Russian attempts to rebuild its empire could bring the old fault line back to life in various ways. 79 the n ew f au lt l i n e s