A major winter storm is crawling along the East Slope of the Cascades, sifting down a sheet of fine, granular snow. Schools are closed and Marilyn wisely stayed off the highway to work from home. We’re supposed to get anywhere from a foot to a foot-and-a-half out of this thing.
So, the gods said, “Go split wood.”
I have plenty of wood already split, but one does not simply ignore such a directive. There is absolutely nothing better than a heavy snowfall at 20 degrees, swinging a sledge and a splitting maul and turning big pieces of wood into small pieces of wood.
And, of course, pondering the geostrategic implications of what appears to be a strong tilt toward Moscow in the pending Trump administration.
•••••
I sense big things afoot — a tectonic shift. Craig Rullman and I have been ponderating this at some length for many moons now. The world is primed… for what? Revolution? A World War I-style slide into catastrophe? Some kind of crash and reset.
The nomination of Rex Tillerson for Secretary of State is a very significant development, one that confirms President-elect Donald Trump’s sympathy toward Russia. It would be a mistake to underestimate Tillerson’s qualifications — you don’t get to be the head of a major oil company unless you are highly intelligent and geopolitically savvy. Tillerson is reportedly both, in spades. And he has established a remarkable working relationship with Russian Tsar Vladimir Putin.
I think it’s simplistic to portray Trump as merely a stooge of Putin. I suspect that Trump naturally and instinctively identifies with the Russian strongman (in part because of Putin’s great personal wealth, but mostly because Trump is a fundamentally weak man who is attracted to tough guys).
Yet, I also think that Trump and the team he is assembling ideologically swerve away from the Establishment Atlanticist paradigm that has driven U.S. foreign policy since 1945.
In short, they don’t have a big problem with Russia asserting its interests and reestablishing its geostrategic hegemony over the Eurasian continent. In fact, they see mutual interests — from oil exploration in the Arctic to combating a mutual enemy in Islamic radicalism. And they simply like the Russians a whole lot more than they like the Chinese.
The center of the world, according to the Eurasianists.
If there is, in fact, a broad tilt toward Moscow, that’s a tectonic shift that will make China very angry and make Europe very nervous — especially Ukraine and Georgia and even the Baltic states.
Those states are obviously on Russia’s western periphery; they’re not the true interest of the Eurasia-oriented ideologues who seem to have gained a great deal of throw-weight in Putin’s Russia over the past few years.
Eurasianism has a long pedigree — though it’s usually been on the far right margins of Russian political thinking. Eurasianism considers the “East” the center of gravity of Russia, and considers Russia, as a metaphysical concept, to be separate and different from Europe. It’s strongly tied to Orthodox tradition and is authoritarian in its political philosophy.
Eurasianism is, in every sense, opposed to the political, ideological, material and social values of the West.
Putin is a pragmatist, and he’s probably using the Eurasianist philosophy to inculcate a sense of nationalism and us-against-the-world solidarity that bolsters his authority. But I think he also genuinely shares many of the instincts of the ideology. And once he established his domestic dominance, he launched a long-term project to disrupt and destabilize the West.
There seems to be no doubt that Russia actively sought to disrupt the 2016 presidential election, although I suspect it is taking things too far to think that they had a “plan” to get Trump elected. Simply stirring the pot and raising questions of legitimacy would have been enough. Putin must, however, be pretty happy with the outcome. He’s getting men he can work with.
There’s a lot of pearl-clutching going on about Russia’s interference, which must seem like a pretty good joke in the Kremlin.
The U.S. would never meddle in someone’s election — except in Iran, Indonesia, South Vietnam, Italy, Mexico, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Afghanistan….
So, what happens if the U.S. decides that it is comfortable with a “Eurasianist” Russia? How do Eurasianists, who form their identity in large part in metaphysical opposition to the West, react to a suddenly more receptive and cooperative U.S.?
Putin will seek a free hand in what he sees as Russia’s sphere of influence (the old Soviet Empire) and an easing of sanctions on individual members of his elite. He’ll likely get both.
It will be very interesting to see how Trump’s Iran hawks will square their suspicion of that regime with a cozy relationship with Iran’s partner, Russia. In fact, the status and stature of Iran may be the telling point in the success or failure of a new U.S.-Russia relationship. Bear in mind that the Russians and the Iranians basically just won the Syrian Civil War with the re-taking of Aleppo. Their man Assad will continue to rule in the ruins and the Iranian arc that runs from Iran across Iraq and Syria to its client Hezbollah in Lebanon is preserved.
Interesting times.
I see a lot more than a “reset” with with Russia, which the Obama administration touted and failed to deliver upon. I see a deep change and a marginalization of the Atlanticists (think John McCain).
This has the potential to be highly disruptive of the post-War world order, which has, ironically, been breaking down ever since its apparent triumph over the Soviet Union fell in 1991. It’s nerve-wracking at best and downright mad at worst to committed Atlanticists — which is most of us, since that’s the paradigm that we’ve lived in for 70 years.
We’ve only dealt with Russia in a couple of ways — as an enemy or as a prostrate, shambolic mess that we could exploit and remake in the image of Western capitalism.
Not sure how it goes if we accept Russia as a legitimate Eurasian empire — a third pole (the other being China) in the great geopolitical scheme.
Such a change would likely create oscillations that spin the world in unexpected directions. That could be a good thing — but there’s also the potential for chaos.
Sure gives a feller plenty to ponder while he swings the splitting maul and the snow tumbles down from the iron sky.
Paul McNamee says
At least you’re dressed for the part! 😀
We’re supposed to get the chill next two days but warmed up to rain for the weekend.
JimC says
I love my steppe hat.
Paul McNamee says
On a more serious reply, good thoughts here. Someone was asking what/why Russia wanted. I figure it’s not anything too deep. Just get a ineffectual buffoon in the White House and Russia gets room to stretch.
Bonus that the incoming regime is pro-Russia or at least sympathetic.
JimC says
Yep. Putin’s calculus has been that if he can disrupt the strong, he gets a greater space in which to operate. Simple enough.
The Obama/Clinton “reset” failed because the U.S. really only offered better relations if Russia towed our line. Putin wasn’t having that, and he found some pretty effective ways of saying “Fuck you.” (Syria).
We may actually get better relations with Russia under Trump — the price being no more pressure on human rights, easing of economic punishment of Putin’s cronies — and maybe a blind eye to consolidating the Donetsk Oblast enclave. Hell, Putin may take another bite of Georgia if he’s emboldened enough.
That all sounds bad from our Atlanticist mindset, but would any of those developments actually be against U.S. interests? Would it be worth it to engage Russia in holding a tight rein on Iran in the ME? I can’t answer those questions for myself yet, and I foresee a ridiculous reading/study binge coming on. All for sport, I guess — I’m not in the running for a post in the Trump Admin.
Jim says
Seems to me that’s what Russia had in the White House for eight years an ineffectual buffoon. In 2008 when Hillary asked who do you want to answer the phone at 3am. Apparently it was neither her or Obama. They both punted when the call came. Obama just drew another line further back and Hillary texted her daughter and rolled over and went to sleep.
David J. West says
I find we’re in agreement. Great post.
JimC says
I was also thinking that all this Eurasianist stuff is most “Howardian.” I’m reading “Black Wind, White Snow: The Rise of Russia’s New Nationalism” and I exclaimed aloud “Hyborian Age!” It’s like freakin’ catnip, studying this stuff. I’m rolling around on the floor in paroxysms of geopolitical ecstasy.
David J. West says
I love reading history that makes my mind ride the Howardian trails.
deuce says
Glad to see you’re laying in more wood, Jim. Winter has finally arrived here in SEK. That’s a great painting by Vasnetsov. He has quite an oeuvre. In fact, Russia has produced a number of excellent painters.
Tillerson started out as a lowly engineer at Exxon and worked his way up. He’s earned his way to where he is now.
You left out BHO’s meddling in the Israeli election and Brexit:
http://thehill.com/policy/international/236565-netanyahu-pollster-obama-role-in-election-larger-than-reported
http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/barack-obama-united-kingdom-european-union-brexit-1.3546531
Putin is not a nice guy. I wouldn’t trust him to run the US, but Russia is emphatically not the US. He is not a globalist and he is a patriot, in his way, IMO. Merkel could take some lessons in those areas. Life expectancies in Putin’s Russia are still rising, if slowly. Meanwhile, in the Butterfly Messiah’s America (I voted for him twice), white life expectancy is now dropping:
http://www.wsj.com/articles/life-expectancy-for-white-americans-declines-1461124861
In regard to the Eurasianists not holding to all the Western values, that can be said, ten times over, for the mandarins in Beijing. In some ways, doesn’t Eurasianism sound like a Russian echo of American Exceptionalism and Manifest Destiny? How is it that far from the (spectacularly failed) “Pivot to Asia”/Pacific Rim reindeer games we’ve been playing? Suddenly we’re “Asia Facing” when we wanna be and “Atlanticist” when we feel like it.
As far as the situations in the Ukraine and Georgia are concerned, what we’ve been fed over here isn’t the entire story, not by a long shot. Uncle Sam and NATO have been meddling along the Russian periphery since the fall of the Wall, despite assurances to the Russians in 1990 to the contrary. They have not forgotten and I don’t blame them.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/nato-s-eastward-expansion-did-the-west-break-its-promise-to-moscow-a-663315.html
JimC says
We have a remarkable blindness to the manner in which our actions are perceived by other peoples. Our support of various colored revolutions in Eastern Europe is NOT seen as benign by Russia — and I truly think we don’t understand why. Kinda like GW Bush’s famous “Why do they hate us when we’re so good?” We meddle all the time, everywhere, and are amazed when anybody takes exception to it.
Now, I am not arguing that we should not project soft power and hard power where it’s needed. We’re an Empire, like it or not, and must function as one. But not having a clear grasp of how the other guy thinks and the potential consequences of your actions is just idiotic.
Presidents Bush and Obama were remarkably similar in their assumptions that our values are universal values and that if only people are exposed to them they will blossom like seeds planted in fertile soil and watered by a gentle rain. That’s nuts. Therefore… Iraq. Therefore Libya. Same damn mistake, though different scale because of Bush’s eagerness to commit force and Obama’s reluctance to do the same.
Though there are people within the structure of the military and intelligence communities that are NOT naive, our policy continues to be.
Ryan says
I can understand removing Gaddahfi (that guy was scum). The thing is that Donald Dumbass (rumsfeld) fired all the people who could speak arabic from the defense department on the ground they would be pro arab.
When we occupied japan we left the infrastructure intact and slowly phased it out to be replaced with democratic values
JimC says
Regime change without adequate post-event planning is trouble. Saddam was scum, too. We don’t seem to reckon in the destabilization effect of removing a power structure that has been in place for decades.
Breaker Morant says
Throwing a book into the mix.I have a weakness for “River” books that geographically follow rivers and so forth. One near the top of my to-read list is “Black Dragon River: A Journey Down the Amur River at the Borderlands of Empires.”
With the streams of thought generated by the post-I may move this one up high on the to-read list.
I think it is safe to say that most here in the west envision Siberia being swallowed by China-most likely unofficially. It is probably a good thing that Russian thoughts have other ideas and long-term visions.
JimC says
Sounds intriguing. China benefited from Russia’s asset stripping of that region in the dark days of the 1990s and early 2000s, but they better think twice about making moves on it. Russia would definitely go to war.
Saddle Tramp says
Jim…
Agreed that chopping wood is the best Zen approach to it all right now. This is a massive con job. Social media of which I am partaking as I type, is one of the greatest weapons in their hands ( no offense to present company). We are quickly entering a hyper- abnormalization. The only thing Orwell was off on with his book ” 1984 ” was the year. I was wrong about Trump once and I hope to hell I am wrong again, but I fear not. Let him prove me wrong and I will gladly eat my words digital or otherwise. On another note, I attended the 45th anniversary of THE LAST PICTURE SHOW last night backagain to the Ahyra Fine Arts Theatre. The film waa significantly shot in Black & White. It’s worth seeing the film just to hear it with the great soundtrack. Peter Bogdanovich did a Q&A following the film. Yes I am aware of his peccadillos or worse, but I would never get in the ring with him and go toe to toe on film history. When explaining why he shot it in Black and White he said that it was at Orson Welles very strong advice. Insistence really. He said it just looks better and you don’t have to worry about all color considerations. At that point Bogdanovich quipped that Donald Trump could no doubt benefit from the same. That’s as political as it got.
THE LAST PICTURE SHOW is a great film. I disagee with Peckinpah who dismissed it other than Ben Johnson’s performance. I definitely agree with him on Ben Johnson though. As Bogdanovich (and yes he was wearing his signature bandanna as he refers to it) an echo of his desire to be a cowboy, correctly stated that what made Ben’s performance so great was that he was real. A real cowboy for one thing. A man of few words. John Ford also lent Bogdanovich a hand in getting Ben Johnson to break away from being John Wayne’s side-kick. It took several tries but Ben finally relented. Glad he did. Trump and Putin don’t add up in my book. Ben Johnson does!! I almost moved to Archer City, TX where the film was shot and the story based from. I was going to rent a cheap place to double as storage after I hit the open road. The outfit I hired on with were based just south of Windthorst, Texas and Archer City was a crossroads when I worked out of Texas until coming out to California. Knowing the town and territory brought a deeper level to the film for me.
The film probably had too many emotional entanglements for Peckinpah. Funny thing also is that Bogdanovich said he turned down THE GETAWAY because he thought Ali McGraw was miscast in it. He still feels that way. He gave some other significant ones away as well.
He said John Wayne called to congratulate him and said it was a damn good film (THE LAST PICTURE SHOW)!but he could not let his kids watch it. Never said outright in the film but the All American go go go coach character was gay as was noted in the script notes, but impied somewhat in the film itself. Not all things are as they appear. Ben Johnson did win the Oscar as Bogdanovich promised would happen. Ben would have just been happy with riding a horse andvnevrr sayinh acword, but a damn good thing he took the role. Not a shoot em’ up machismo driven film for sure. A few implied and displayed guns, but nevet a shot fired. Hearing Hank Williams could not have been more perfect.
On one visit to Archer City, seeing Larry McMurtry with with a two-wheeler stacked with books crossing the street heading for BOOKED UP 1 (back when he was still a resident) was not a machismo scene either. Neither was meeting and talking to him. Never moved to Archer City because the absentee owner of the place I agreed to rent (because she had not recieved any offers for it after being on the market over a year) called me one week before I was supposed to move my stuff in saying someone wanted to buy it and her brother who lived in AC still had another place for me. I let her off the hook on our contract and passed on the place her brother had. Not what I was wanting. Instead I put everything in a storage unit in Wichita Falls and lived strictly on the road for the next 7 years. A reason for everything I guess.
Orson Welles lived with Bogdanovich and Cybil Shepard for a period of time. Bogdanovich was also the last one to speak to Orson Welles (on the phone) shortly before he died. That is legacy enough to carry whatever your opinion of him may be. He regaled us with great stories and impersonations of his actor friends, Film moguls and directors. His stories about Jimmy Stewart and that he was considered for the part Ben Johnson got, but decided it would not fit. He chose well as I think he did with the entire casting. It was an extended Q&A compared to what I have typically experienced. I could have listened all night.
The theatre was the same one that played the first screening 45 years ago and launched many an actors career. All these geopolitical machinations have been the way of the world for a long long time. However, something feels eerily different this time. Tectonic shifts? An apt description it seems. Something in my bones feel like it’s not gonna be better as promised…
Doublethink? Doubletalk? Two sides of the same coin. What agenda is being written. Yours or mine? I can only speak for myself in that I am not in that bracket.
As they say: A big man bends down the farthest but also fights up the food chain and not down. You saw that with Ben Johnson as ” Sam The Lion “.
Again the Big Screen the only way to see it…
THE LAST PICTURE SHOW: A great look. A great sound. A great cast. It’s up there in my book, especially Ben Johnson!!
Putin and Trump are not. Prove me wrong. I can take it…
JimC says
Been years since I’ve seen it, but that is a great movie.
Nice tribute to Ben Johnson.
john roberts says
Surveillance everywhere and the world dividing into Eurasia, Eastasia and Oceania. Where have we seen this before?
JimC says
Right George?
Rick Schwertfeger says
All this is tremendously thoughtful and thought-provoking. Thanks.
JimC says
And thanks for reading.
Fletcher Vredenburgh says
I’m not ready for winter, let alone a major snowfall yet. Dang!
I tend to sympathize with Russia and its people. They’ve been on the butt end of history and European attitudes for centuries. To say we treated them with a high hand since 1990, even when we should have been forging a real friendship with them, is spot on. They definitely scare me less and hold more to our values (whatever they’re really worth anymore) than the PRC.
Hell, I’m even on their side re: the Crimea. It’s just their love of a strongman and unwillingness to see themselves how other see them – frightening – that makes me hesitant and leery of Trump’s seeming affinity for Putin and co.
I was listening to that Putin mouthpiece, Stephen Cohen, this morning, and he dismisses any efforts by the Baltics, Ukraine, or Georgia to secure protection from their past overlords as inexcusable and worthy of aggressive Russian responses. I admit to having a little more interest Eastern and Central Europe these days than Western part these days, but I don’t want to see our economic and global alliances undermined. Crazy times.
We (meaning many regulars here) having been pondering what’s coming next. Seeing how we still haven’t recovered from the 14-18 war that’s the last sort of catastrophe we need. Watching the Chinese in the South China Sea, the mass movement of whole nations into Western Europe, and the ongoing Sunni-Shia war burning in SW Asia, though, makes me more than a little fearful of the future.
Thanks for making me think about this before trying to go to sleep.
JimC says
I actually had a dream early this morning that I was working in an office that was bugged by Putin’s security people. Crazy.
There’s good reason to be on edge about the future. I think that would have been the case regardless of the 2016 election — though Trump is definitely a more disruptive force than Clinton would have been. However, the foreign policy pursued by Obama/Clinton contributed to the vacuum of leadership that encourages the kinds of oscillations we’re feeling.
Saddle Tramp says
What’s ” coming ” next or perhaps has already arrived ” live ” on screens daily? A severe and major shift are just a heightened access by media? I fear it is much more than that. An erosion of major proportions regarding the commonality of direction…
” Today, there’s a general numbing of the audience. There’s too much murder and killing. You make people insensitive by showing it all the time. The body count in pictures is huge. It numbs the audience into thinking it’s not so terrible. Back in the ’70s, I asked Orson Welles what he thought was happening to pictures, and he said, “We’re brutalizing the audience. We’re going to end up like the Roman circus, live at the Coliseum.” The respect for human life seems to be eroding. ”
— Peter Bogdanovich
JimC says
And that’s 40 years ago…
Bill Valenti says
A sterling analysis, Jim. It is a tri-polar world, and I expect lots of friction as the US, China and Russia seek to dominate their respective “spheres”. My gut tells me that, given Trump’s sordid business history, his indebtedness to Russian oligarchs has played, and will play, a major role in the US/Russia relationship going forward. Pity that we let such a willfully ignorant character into the driver seat.
JimC says
It would be very interesting to see the financials, wouldn’t it?
Finn says
“Finland has always attacked from the east” said Gen. Adolf Ehrnrooth (1905-2004) Mannerheim Cross 1944.
When putin is stronger Finland and Baltic countries are again in danger zone….Sure hope that USA will not forget us …
JimC says
I was thinking of you as I wrote this post.
Breaker Morant says
I am a geographer at heart and I pulled another book off the (metaphorical) shelf that I read a few years called “The Revenge of Geography: What the Map Tells Us About Coming Conflicts and The Battle Against Fate” by Robert Kaplan
IIRC, there was a lot of discussion about the Eurasian land mass and so forth. I plan to skim parts asap. Kaplan also wrote books about the South China Sea and the Monsoon regions bordering the Indian Ocean.
Another similar book is “Prisoners of Geography:Ten Maps that Explain Everything About the World” by Tim Marshall. I think the Marshall book was an easier read. Both are good-but going from memory I would recommend the Kaplan book of the 2.
JimC says
Kaplan has his flaws, but he sure gets the imperial nature of things…
Saddle Tramp says
Is the fox being let into the Hen House? Ahem… or rather on the way to the White House riding on the backs of blind populism?
Jim I do not need to tell you that history repeats itself. A loaded statement for sure. It’s the same parade but different uniforms and different streets. This feels different though. Also, just because you are paranoid does not mean that your office (or your dreams) are not bugged. Some practical paranoia is healthy. The rules are changing. They say some things never change so to speak, but for our country I feel I am now a witness to something not even close to anything previous at this scale. This is beyond blatant. Maybe I should just retreat back to my apolitical position. Is this resignation? Cowardice? Mere practicality? Take your pick.
The cake that is baking now smells of all the elements of something fed to a hungry group long ago, but not that long ago.
My other fear is that something Sinclair Lewis once said may apply:
” If fascism ever comes to the United States it will wrapped in a flag and carrying a cross. ”
I would add: A false flag and a false cross.
The details of how, why, where and when will wend itself out eventually and probably too late.
The way of the world?
Fortify my position?
Leave it at that?
I guess…
My apologies for taking up so much real estate…
JimC says
No apologies. What the space is for.
john roberts says
Russians approve of strongman rule because they have seen true anarchy. Anyone who thinks that anarchy would be fun has never seen the real thing. Russians have, repeatedly, throughout their history. There is a reason they think Ivan the Terrible was a great Czar. If you’re wondering why Putin is so popular there, it’s because he reestablished order after the anarchy that followed the breakup of the USSR.
JimC says
And we would be no different in similar circumstances.
JimC says
Here’s an article by Michael Weiss on the contradiction inherent in a tough-on-Iran/friendly-with-Russia stance. Weiss knows his stuff — he was an early, spot-on analyst of the ISIS phenomenon — and should be heeded.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/12/15/iran-yes-iran-just-won-the-battle-of-aleppo-what-s-trump-gonna-do.html
JimC says
This from SOFREP:
https://sofrep.com/70033/us-deploying-tanks-troops-eastern-europe-amid-record-high-tensions-russia/
Traven Torsvan says
I think I remember reading somewhere that a lot of the Russiophobia that drove 19th century British imperialism in Asia, was for the most part imagined. I mean not totally, but the scenarios of secret plots and cossacks ready to swarm over the Himalayas to put India under the boot of Tsarist tyranny as opposed to Anglo tyranny, was for most part fever dreams of the British establishment. Have you come across that in your readings on the Great Game?
JimC says
Yes, both Hopkirk and the book “Tournament of Shadows” deal with that. Much like the run-up to the First World War, everybody imagined the worst intent and the highest capability in their adversaries and felt the need to act aggressively in self-defense.