Truthdig: A Loss of Transatlantic Harmony

[marmar]

A Loss of Transatlantic Harmony

Posted on Jul 6, 2008
By William Pfaff


The relationship among the three principal centers of world power of the past half-century is now at the edge of fundamental change. A great deal has been said about the rise of China and India as Asian power centers rival to, or added to, Japan, but this still is more ambition than reality.

China and India are certainly newly important trading and manufacturing nations, but global great powers do not make their living as subcontractors to foreign industry, or as makers and vendors of goods designed or invented elsewhere. For China and India, this remains the case.

The three existing power centers are still the United States, Europe and Russia. “Europe” means Western Europe, not the 27-member European Union. The new, enlarged EU is actually less important than the pre-enlargement EU. The states included in the most recent enlargements have so far contributed more weakness than strength to the union.

Russia still has a place in the trio because of its very considerable residual nuclear strategic power, and its ambition. Its economic and industrial strength remains more potentiality than reality. But under Dimitri Medvedev and Vladimir Putin, Russia is determined to hold its place in the front rank of international politics and diplomacy, and should not be underestimated. (I cite the two in order of protocol; we’ll see about real power when Medvedev’s first term is up.)

President Medvedev made Russia’s ambition plain in the interview he gave to eight leading newspapers last week in anticipation of the G8 summit that opens Monday in Japan. He suggested that the time has passed when the United States is in a position to dominate management of the international economy.

The United States, he said, is today “essentially in a depression.” He might have added that the whole world is in an economic crisis because of the deeply irresponsible decisions, if not criminal manipulations, of the American real estate investment market, themselves patent betrayals of leadership. However, nobody in Europe or Asia seems willing to comment on that, apparently assuming this behavior normal.

The emphasis of Medvedev—as someone trained as a lawyer—on the importance of law and an independent judiciary was an interesting novelty, given events in Russia under Putin. The call for equilibrium in relations with the United States will not get much of a response in today’s Washington, but may in Europe. .......(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20080706_after_the_american_election/