What Does Kissinger Think?
I may have been wrong in dismissing pundits who write that the Ukraine/Russia conflict could lead to WW3. I changed my mind when I saw one of the best-staged photo ops so far this century. Presidents Xi and Putin standing together in Beijing, against A 2022 Beijing Olympic background, pledging that each has the other’s back. Pictures do speak louder than words and these guys are dramatists of the highest order.
It’s ironic that this year marks the fiftieth anniversary since President Richard Nixon traveled to the People’s Republic of China to meet with Chairman Mao tse-Tung in 1972, initiating the first step towards diplomatic relations between the two countries. For the US side (maybe also China!), the meeting sought to drive the PRC from Russian domination, therefore weakening Russia’s position in the Cold War with the US. At the time, and in the decades since, the Nixon rapprochement with China was heralded as a bold and ingenious strategic move driven by uber-diplomat Henry Kissinger.
In an odd twist of history, the Ukraine/Russia dilemma now threatens to unravel Kissinger’s iconic strategy in US foreign relations, as China and Russia stake out a renewed partnership for the 21st century. They may not agree on everything, but each country will cover for the other in their fight with the West.
Maybe Biden’s foreign policy team should review words of caution from George Kennen, a revered diplomat who conceptualized the strategy to ‘contain Russia’ after WW2, who said that NATO expansion would be ‘the most fateful error of American policy in the entire post Cold War period.” Even the architect of the Cold War suggested NATO expansion eastward would unnecessarily provoke the Soviet Union.
Or former National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski who warned ‘the most dangerous scenario…(would be)…a grand coalition of China and Russia,,,united not by ideology but by complementary grievance.” It would be an alliance of pure power. Perhaps to ‘contain’ the USA?
Graham Allison, Professor of Politics at Harvard Kennedy School, put it this way;
This week, President Macron of France took a page from the past, reviving shuttle diplomacy to confer with Putin, Zelensky and Biden separately and forestall a Russian invasion. At least his ideas were good enough to keep Putin in diplomatic talks. And maybe that’s as good as this is going to get. NATO expansion has become a moot point.
But you have to wonder how a pillar of American strategy - keeping a new China-Russia alliance from forming - is breaking down now. Or why successive US presidents didn’t realize NATO expansion would come back to bite us. Or how Russia has modernized and upgraded its military under Putin so that its threats are real again.
And you have to wonder how 175,00 Russian troops can surround Ukraine without itching for a fight.