How do you see the war in Ukraine right now?
Well, it looks like it’s going to be long. And I think the Ukrainians are showing determination, it doesn’t seem possible for Russia to achieve its goals. So the question will be under what conditions will they find a way to reconcile within a free and independent Ukraine? But from now on, doing so would mean acknowledging failure, which Putin cannot tolerate. So we will probably have a stalemate for a long time, it will be violent, but it will be a stalemate where Russia will eventually have to adjust to living in a world that is in danger and with a neighbor that is tied. to Europe. And I think those deep realities are just the ones that will eventually have to be recognized, but it will take a long time to get there.
Is it fair to say that this is the proxy war that the Ukrainians are waging for us, the West’s war against Russia through the Ukrainians?
I don’t think it’s a war against Russia and the West, with Ukraine as a proxy. I think it’s a proxy war, but not Russia against the West, I think it’s Russia against the world. These are the fundamental principles of the Charter of the United Nations. It is whether it is permissible to use violence to annex a neighbor’s territory. It is a matter of sovereignty, it is a matter of peaceful dispute resolution. So while Russia sees the West as the great enemy and the great shadows force Ukraine, Ukraine is an independent country. If Ukraine hadn’t faced Russia, I don’t think Europe or the United States would be there today. I think it’s really their fight for freedom. And it is the global system and its principles, which go back to 1945. And for the founding of the post-war order, all these principles, which are global principles, not just Western principles, are at stake.
Should the West, and NATO in particular, have been more cautious in expanding east, closer to the Russian border? I don’t think you were a big supporter of NATO’s expansion to the East…
It wasn’t, I’ve always been of the opinion that NATO is fantastic. NATO has been a force for good in the world. NATO provides security to countries, in Europe, even in Eastern Europe, but there needed to be some kind of larger trans-European security structure that would include Russia. And indeed, there were efforts to do, right at the end of the Cold War, the association agreements and bring Russia into what was now the G8. They were later expelled from the Crimea. But those efforts failed, not entirely because the West was to blame. Russia has failed to develop a post-imperial identity that would have allowed it to reconcile within traditional borders. So there are many reasons why we got to this point historically, and there are many different things that could have been done differently. But in the end, I don’t think any of this, including NATO expansion, is enough to justify or justify what Putin is doing.
I think some academics like you think that the war in Ukraine has strengthened transatlantic ties, America’s relationship with Europe. Is this really the case or would it be more accurate to say that Europe’s dependence on the US in relation to Security has increased?
Well I think both are true, I think the idea of an independent European force, so to speak, which has always been on the minds of many Europeans, probably most importantly, the French, which is really out of the question, I think , in the short term, we are joined at the hips. And NATO is the preeminent security structure. True, this gives the US an important leadership role in security across Europe, but they are all linked. And they have to move forward together, and that gives the smaller states a voice, and it gives Germany influence in ways that are very important as a country. This is evolving before our very eyes, a new type of security identity. So I think it’s all very positive, I would say that the cooperative aspects of the order outweigh the hierarchical aspects of the order tied to US leadership.
But will the US accept an EU-led European defense once EU countries or major EU powers are developing their own defense capabilities?
I think I understand that the Biden administration and American leaders, for many years before Biden, wanted Europe to develop a greater defense capability to get to 2% of GNP, the level of spending, diversify weapons systems and take on more responsibilities. . So I think this is still very important. It is also important from the American point of view. We call it load sharing. And it’s important from a European perspective, because with capacity comes voice, it has more weight in the functioning of the security alliance. So I think it’s in the interest of both parties, Europe and the United States, to rebalance capabilities. Finally the US: there will come a day when the US will have a kind of domestic policy where it will focus more on China, more on Asia. And therefore Europe needs to build and invest to have at least semi-independent and slightly rebalanced capabilities. So this is all very long term.
It seems that the war in Ukraine is a kind of pause in this American focus on China, because China is more and more important to the United States…
That’s true. But from an American perspective, what happens in Ukraine has huge implications for Asia, but no less important for Taiwan. If Russia, so to speak, is able to achieve its territorial aggression, it would send a message in Asia that we don’t want to send. So I think the connections between the two are very deep and they feel very strong in Washington.
Do you think the United States can lead abroad if there is a big political divide between the two?
It is the most important issue in American politics today. Can we continue to play a leadership role with internal divisions? And my feeling is that there is enough shared consensus among all the other really ugly divisions to put China at the center of American foreign policy. Both Republicans and Democrats believe that competition with China is at the heart of American foreign policy today. And I think support for Ukraine will be driven by the radicals in the House of Representatives, in the Senate, and I think that Senator McConnell of Kentucky, who is the minority leader, is not a liberal. He is fine in the conservative camp, but he, like his Senate colleagues on the Republican side, is committed to supporting Ukraine. Then it will be touched and it will disappear. But I don’t think there will be a collapse of US support for Ukraine.
You mentioned the Radicals in the House of Representatives. With this Republican majority and Kevin McCarthy in deep trouble dealing with this radical Trump bench, what are the political consequences of this?
Well, it’s going to mean there’s not going to be a lot of new programs, there’s going to be kind of… the whole legislative process is going to mostly stop for the next two years, which is really there’s going to be a problem there, there’s going to be investigations into Biden, the kind of weaponizing the congressional committee system in the House. And then eventually there will be these kinds of existential moments where the US government will have to raise the debt ceiling to cover spending, which is already authorized through the congressional system. So the radical right, while it may not be a majority of the Republican members of the House, holds the coalition together and exerts a kind of undue weight, even though it is a small, radical faction of the far right. And they can bring the country to the edge of the debt ceiling, from a fiscal point of view. And that is reaching the end of the road. And let’s see if there are enough moderates on the Republican side to join the Democrats in making the basics of government work. So we’re really at that point, it’s really quite disturbing.
And this edition of the documents, the official documents found in Biden’s private residence is not a sign of good health for the current administration…
Now, I don’t think the laws were broken, but it makes the case against Trump seem less obvious. Trump committed crimes, Biden probably not. But in the broad scheme of American politics, it doesn’t seem so clear.
And the impact of this radical right in the House of Representatives, in terms of the country’s foreign policy? Does it represent in any way a reversal of the multilateral approach that Biden has been trying to reinforce?
It will be another problem that will have to be negotiated, for sure. But I think they won’t have as much of an impact on foreign policy as on domestic policy, creating problems for the Biden investigations, delaying the appointments, delaying the budget, the budget programs. It will be more of that than the ability to undermine Biden’s foreign policy in general.
Can one be optimistic about the future of the liberal international order and the future of democracy?
Well, I’m well known for being an optimist. Looking at the alternatives, the liberal democratic model for international relations still appears to be by far the most viable, most resilient, and most subscribed model in the world. China does not offer anything so attractive. Russia is actively undermining itself and will have very little global influence in the next generation. In fact, it is the liberal democracies, the ones that pioneered and led a system of multilateral cooperation, the ones that are now oriented towards solving problems, managing interdependence, the economy, political security, the environment. The liberal democratic model is, in general, in trouble, it is in crisis, but it remains the only viable model if we want to find a way to govern ourselves in the 21st century. So I think, if only because it’s the only “game in town,” let’s say, because it’s such a big system, I think it has a future. Just find a way to build working relationships across our various political divisions and focus on the big issues, climate change, economic inequality, refugee issues. So if we all focus on the problems, we start to see what kind of general architecture is needed. And that is, in fact, the architecture that liberal democracies have been defending since 1945.
Probably the biggest challenge, the biggest pressure, I would say, is the art of protecting the social contract, based on a globalized world, when there are powers that do everything possible to undermine this model…
Yes, I think the biggest dangers come less from the outside world, Russia and China, and more from the liberal democratic world: Rising inequality during the COVID crisis, the world’s rich 1% earn twice as much as the rest of the world . , the other 99%. As a result, there has been an extraordinary imbalance of wealth and opportunity. And that is very destructive of the social contract. Democracy and capitalism have always had a somewhat awkward relationship. Particularly uncomfortable today, because the winners are winning big and there are more and more losers, and not just within the Western system, but more broadly, in the world in transition, in the developing world. And from an economic point of view, there are countries that are struggling more and more and the standard of living is deteriorating. So there is a lot of work on the economic side to bring growth back and to rebalance wealth and opportunity so that these fragile social contracts can be asserted.
So China is not, after all, the biggest threat to liberal international law…
I think this is true. I think China is a threat, but the biggest threat is the dangers that are emerging in the liberal democratic world.
Source: TSF
