George Friedman

by The Next Decade: Where We've Been --;Where We're Going

  The condition of the Baltic countries is a different matter. They represent a superb offensive capability for the United States, pointing, as they do, like a bayonet at St. Petersburg, the second largest city of Russia, and with the eastern border of Lithuania only about one hundred miles from Minsk, the capital of Belarus.

  Nonetheless, the United States hasn’t the force or the interest to invade Russia. And given that the American position is strategically aggressive and tactically defensive, the Baltics become a liability. About three hundred miles long and nowhere more than two hundred miles wide, they are almost impossible to defend. They do, however, serve to block the Russian navy in St. Petersburg. So the Baltics remain an asset, but one that might be too expensive to maintain. The American president must therefore appear to be utterly committed to the Baltics to deter the Russians, while extracting maximum concessions from the Russians for an American agreement to withdraw from the region. Given Polish skittishness, such a maneuver should be delayed as long as possible. Unfortunately, the Russians will be aware of this fact and will probably bring pressure to bear on the Baltics sooner rather than later, making this a clear and early point of friction.

  Whatever happens to Germany, it is of extreme importance to the United States to maintain a strong bilateral relationship with Denmark, whose waters block the exits from the Baltic Sea. Norway, whose North Cape provides facilities to block the Russian fleet in Murmansk, has value to the United States, as does Iceland, a superb platform from which to search for Russian submarines. Neither country is a member of the European Union, and Iceland is resentful of Germany because of economic actions taken during the 2008 financial crisis. Thus both can be gathered in at relatively low cost.

  The rest of the frontier with Russia will be the Carpathian Mountains, behind which lie Slovakia, Hungary, and Romania. It is a strategic imperative for the United States to maintain friendly relations with these three countries and to help them develop their military capability. But given the obstacle that the Carpathians present to an invader, the military capability required is minimal. Because these countries are less at risk than Poland and therefore freer to maneuver, there also will be a greater degree of political complexity. But so long as the Russians don’t move past the Carpathians and the Germans do not reduce these countries to complete economic dependency, the United States can manage the situation with a simple strategy: strengthen these economies and militaries, make it advantageous to remain pro-American, and wait. Do nothing to provoke the Russians in their sphere of influence. Do nothing to sabotage Russian economic relations with the rest of Europe. Do nothing to worry the rest of the Europeans that the U.S. is going to drag them into a war.

  In the Caucasus, the United States is currently aligned with Georgia, a country that remains under Russian pressure and whose internal politics are in the long run unpredictable, to say the least. The next line of countries, Armenia and Azerbaijan, is also problematic. The former is a Russian ally, the latter closer to Turkey. Because of historical hostility to Turkey, Armenia is always closer to Russia. Azerbaijan tries to balance among Turkey, Iran, and Russia.

  It is one thing for the United States to stake out a position in Poland, a country of 40 million people. Remaining committed to Georgia, a country of only 4 million that is far less developed than Poland, is much more difficult. And defeat in Georgia, in the form of a pro-Russian government that would ask U.S. advisers and forces to leave, would not only unravel the American position in the Caucasus but create a crisis of confidence in Poland as well.

  The situation in the Caucasus can be handled only by Turkey. Whereas Russia’s border moved north, unveiling the three historic states of Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia, Turkey’s border has remained stable. For the United States, it does not matter where the Russian tier is, so long as it is somewhere in the Caucasus. The only disastrous outcome would be a Russian occupation of Turkey, which is inconceivable, or a Russo-Turkish alliance, which is a more realistic danger.

  Turkey and Russia have been historical rivals, two empires on the Black Sea, both competing in the Balkans and the Caucasus. More important, the Russians look at the Bosporus as their blocked gate to the Mediterranean. Turkey may well collaborate with the Russians in the next decade, particularly given dependency on Russian oil, but the idea that it would shift its own border in the Caucasus southward or abandon the Bosporus in any way is out of the question. Simply by existing, then, Turkey serves American interests in relation to Russia. And since the United States has no interest in the specifics of where Russia is contained in the Caucasus, as long as it is contained, it follows that a vast American commitment to Georgia makes little sense. Georgia is a drain on the United States with little benefit. So the American strategy in Georgia should be eliminated. It is left over from the period in which the Americans believed that such positions were risk- and cost-free. At a time when risks and costs are rising, the United States must manage its exposure more carefully, recognizing that Georgia is more liability than asset.

  In the next decade there will be a small window in which the United States can extract itself from Georgia and the Caucasus without causing psychological damage to its new coalition. But most likely, abandoning Georgia would create psychological uncertainty in Poland and in the Intermarium that could very quickly cause those countries to recalculate their stance. Waiting until Poland and Russia confront each other would simply increase the magnitude of the stress. Therefore, rethinking Georgia as soon as possible has four advantages. First, it gives the United States time to stabilize the Intermarium’s psychology. Second, it makes it clear that the United States is making this move for its own reasons, not because of Russian pressure. Third, it will demonstrate to the Turks that the United States can shift positions, making an increasingly confident Turkey more wary of the United States—and sometimes wary is good. Fourth, the United States can ask for Russian concessions in Central Asia in return for backing off in the Caucasus.

  As long as the United States is still fighting in Afghanistan, it needs unfettered access to the nearby countries it relies on for logistical support. American oil companies also need access to Central Asian oil and gas deposits. In the long run, the United States is leaving Afghanistan, and in the long run, the United States can’t be a dominant force in the region. Geography simply precludes American dominance, and the Russians know that.

  The United States made promises to Georgia that it now isn’t going to keep. But when we look at the broader picture, this betrayal increases America’s ability to keep other commitments. Georgia is of little importance to the United States, but it is of enormous importance to the Russians, guaranteeing the security of their southern frontier. The Russians would be prepared to pay a substantial price for Georgia, and U.S. willingness to exit voluntarily and soon should command a premium.

  That price would be not to supply Iran with weapons and to join in an effective sanctions regime if the U.S. overture to Iran fails. If the overture succeeds, then the United States can demand that Russia halt weapons shipments into the region, particularly to Syria. If made simultaneously with the overture to Iran, an agreement like this would lend the overture greater weight. It would give the United States more credibility and expanded options. It could also buy time in Poland to build up American assets there.

  As a U.S. foothold in the Caucasus, Georgia is much less viable than Azerbaijan, which not only borders Russia and Iran and maintains close relations with Turkey but is a major source of oil. Whereas Armenia is a Russian ally and Georgia lacks a strong economic foundation, Azerbaijan has economic resources and can be a platform for American operations. So in the next decade there will need to be a strategy of withdrawal and a strategy of realignment. Both will do. The current strategy will not.

  If the United States convinces Russia that its withdrawal from Georgia is elective, phased, and above all reversible, it can extract concessions that have real meaning while rationalizing its strategic position. In a sense
it is a bluff, but a good president needs to be able to bluff, as well as to rationalize a betrayal.

  HOW TO MANAGE RUSSIA

  Russia does not threaten America’s global position, but the mere possibility that it might collaborate with Europe and particularly Germany opens up the most significant threat in the decade, a long-term threat that needs to be nipped in the bud. The United States can’t expect Germany to serve the role it played in the Cold War as the frontier set against the Soviet empire. In the next decade, the United States must work to make Poland what Germany was in the 1950s, although the Russian threat will not be as significant, forceful, or monochromatic as it was then. At the same time that the geopolitical confrontation goes on, the United States and Russia will be engaged in economic and political collaboration elsewhere. This is not your daddy’s Cold War. The two countries might well collaborate in Central Asia or even the Caucasus while confronting each other in Poland and the Carpathians.

  In the long run, the Russians are in trouble and can’t sustain a major role in international affairs. Their dependence on commodity exports fills their coffers but doesn’t build their economy. Their population is in severe decline. Their geographic structure is unchanged. But in geopolitics, a decade is not the long run. The mere collapse of the Soviet Union took a decade to run its course. For this decade, the threat of Russia and Europe will persist, and it will preoccupy the president as he attempts to restore balance to U.S. global strategy.

  CHAPTER 9

  EUROPE’S RETURN TO HISTORY

  Contemporary Europe is a search for an exit from hell. The first half of the twentieth century was a slaughterhouse, from Verdun to Auschwitz. The second half was lived under threat of a possible U.S.-Soviet nuclear war fought out on European soil. Exhausted by blood and turmoil, Europe began to imagine a world in which all conflicts were economic and bureaucrats in Brussels managed them. They even began to talk of “the end of history,” in the sense that all Hegelian conflicts of ideology had been resolved. For the twenty years following the collapse of the Soviet Union, it appeared to them that they had found their utopia, but now the future is much less certain. Looking ahead to the next ten years, I do not see a return to trenches and concentration camps, but I do see geopolitical tensions on the continent growing, and with them the roots of more serious conflict.

  Two problems make up the European dilemma for the decade ahead. The first is defining the kind of relationship Europe will have with a resurgent Russia. The second is determining the role that Germany, Europe’s most dynamic economy, will play. The paradox of Russia—weak economy and substantial military force—will persist, as will the dynamism of Germany. The remainder of the European states must define their relationship with these two powers as a prerequisite for defining their relationships with one another. The strain of this process will lead to the emergence of a very different sort of Europe in the next decade, and it will present a significant challenge to the United States. To understand what needs to be done in terms of U.S. policy, we first have to consider the history that has brought us to this juncture.

  Europe has always been a bloody place. After 1492, when new discoveries fueled the competition for far-flung empires, the continent hosted a struggle for world domination involving Spain, Portugal, France, the Netherlands, and Britain, countries that bordered either the Atlantic Ocean or the North Sea. Austria-Hungary and Russia were left out of the contest for colonial empires, while Germany and Italy remained clusters of feudal principalities, fragmented and impotent.

  Europe—1815

  For the next two centuries Europe consisted of four regions—Atlantic Europe, Scandinavia, southeastern Europe, and Russia—with a buffer zone in the center running from Denmark to Sicily. This buffer was a region fragmented into tiny kingdoms and duchies, unable to defend itself but inadvertently providing Europe with a degree of stability.

  Then Napoleon redefined Europe. When he pushed east into Germany and south into Italy, he wrecked the complex balance that had existed in those two inchoate nations. Worse, from his point of view, he energized Prussia, goading it into becoming a major European power. It was the Prussians, more than anyone, who engineered Napoleon’s defeat at the Battle of Waterloo. A half century later, after a brief and successful war with France in 1871, Prussia united the rest of Germany into a cohesive state. The unification of Italy was by and large completed at about the same time.

  Suddenly there was a new geopolitical reality from the North Sea to the Mediterranean. Germany in particular was troublesome, because of its enormous productivity and rapid growth and also because its geography made it profoundly insecure. History had placed Germany on the north of the North European Plain, an area with a few rivers to serve as defenses, but some of the most productive parts of this new nation-state were on the opposite bank of the Rhine, completely unprotected. To the west was France. To the east was Russia. Both had enjoyed the centuries when Germany was fragmented and weak, but now there was a frightening new Germany, economically the most dynamic country in Europe, with a powerful military and with a deep sense of insecurity.

  Germany in turn was frightened by its neighbors’ fears. Germany’s leaders knew their nation could not survive if it was attacked simultaneously by France and Russia. They also believed that at some point such an attack would come, because they understood how intimidating they appeared to their neighbors. Germany could not permit France and Russia to start a war at the time or place of their choosing, and thus Germany, driven by its own fear, devised a strategy of preemption coupled with alliances.

  Europe in the twentieth century was defined by these fears, which, being imposed by geography, were both rational and unavoidable. To no one’s surprise, that same geography is in place today. The Europeans tried to abolish the consequences of geography by eliminating nationalism, but as we have already begun to see, nationalism is not easily suppressed, and geography must have its due. These issues remain particularly compelling in the case of Germany, which is once again, as in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the economic engine of Europe, profoundly insecure and surrounded by nations with potentially divergent interests. The question going forward is whether the geopolitical logic that led to the wars of the past will have the same result or whether, in the years to come, Europe can pass the test of comity it failed so often before.

  Both world wars were launched according to a single scenario: Germany, insecure because of its geographical position, swept across France in a lightning attack. The goal in both cases was to defeat France quickly, then deal with Russia. In 1914, the Germans failed to defeat France quickly, the troops dug in, and the conflict became a protracted war. The Germans found themselves fighting France, Britain, and Russia simultaneously in both the east and the west. At the same time that it appeared the Bolshevik revolution would save Germany by taking Russia out of the war, the United States sent troops to Europe, playing its first major role on the world stage and blocking German ambitions.

  In 1940 Germany succeeded in overrunning France, only to discover that it still could not defeat the Soviet Union. One reason for that was the second act of America’s dramatic emergence. The United States provided aid to the Soviets that kept them in the war until the Anglo-American invasion of France three years later could help destroy Germany for the second time in a quarter century.

  Germany emerged from World War II humiliated by defeat but also morally humiliated by its unprecedented barbarism, having committed atrocities that had nothing to do with the necessities of geopolitics. Germany was divided and occupied by the victors.

  Germany was physically devastated, but its actions had resulted in the devastation of something far more important. For five hundred years, Europe had dominated the world. Before the wave of self-destruction that began in August 1914, Europe directly controlled vast areas of Asia and Africa and indirectly dominated much of the rest of the planet. Tiny countries like Belgium and the Netherlands controlled areas as vast as the Congo or tod
ay’s Indonesia.

  The wars that followed the creation of Germany destroyed these empires. In addition, the slaughter of the two wars, the destruction of generations of workers and extraordinary amounts of capital, left Europe exhausted. Its empires dissolved into fragments to be fought over by the only two countries that emerged from the conflict with the power and interest to compete for what was left, the United States and the Soviet Union. However, both primarily pursued the fragments of empire as a system of alliances and commercial relations rather than formal imperial domination.

  Europe went from being the center of a world empire to being the potential battleground for a third world war. At the heart of the Cold War was the fear that the Soviets, having marched into the center of Germany, would seize the rest of the continent. For Western Europe, the danger was obvious. For the United States, the greatest threat was that Soviet manpower and resources would be combined with European industrialism and technology to create a power potentially greater than the U.S. Fearing the threat to its interests, the United States focused on containing the Soviet Union around its periphery, including Europe.

  Two issues converged, setting the stage for the events that will be played out over the next ten years. The first was the question of Germany’s role in Europe, which ever since its nineteenth-century unification had been to trigger wars. The second was the shrinking of European power. By the end of the 1960s, not a single European country save the Soviet Union was genuinely global. All the rest had been reduced to regional powers, in a region where their collective power was dwarfed by the power of the Soviet Union and the United States. If Germany had to find a new place in Europe, Europe had to find its new place in the world.