The strategic triad: The United States, Russia and China

New Left Review

Volumn , Issue 228, 1998, Pages 91-125

  Achcar, Gilbert ^a  

^a NONE

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EID: 0032369037     PISSN: 00286060     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
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References (119)

1. This article has benefitted from criticism and comments from members of the CIRPES (EHESS Paris), especially its director Alain Joxe, and Maurice Ronai, and I extend my graitude to all of them. It goes without saying however that the views expressed herein are entirely my own responsibility.
2. The expression comes from Charles Krauthammer, 'The Unipolar Moment', in G. Allison and G.F. Treverton, eds., Rethinking America's Security: Beyond Cold War to New World Order, New York 1992.
3. Department of Defense, Report on the Quadrennial Defense Review, Washington 1997, published on the World Wide Web (www).
4. See Le débat stratégique américain 1995-96, Cahier d'Etudes Stratégiques, 20, CIRPES (GSD, EHESS) Paris 1997.
5. For the technical arguments inevitably raised by the administration's choices, see (among others): Zalmay Khalilzad and David Ochmanek, 'Rethinking US Defence Planning', Survival (IISS, London), vol. 39, no. I, Spring 1997; D.S. Zakheim, 'Tough Choices: Toward a True Strategic Review', The National Interest (Washington), no. 47, Spring 1997; W.E. Odom, 'Transforming the Military', Foreign Affairs, vol. 76, no. 4, July-August 1997, and replies to this article in the November-December issue (vol. 76, no. 6) of the same journal.
6. For the technical arguments inevitably raised by the administration's choices, see (among others): Zalmay Khalilzad and David Ochmanek, 'Rethinking US Defence Planning', Survival (IISS, London), vol. 39, no. I, Spring 1997; D.S. Zakheim, 'Tough Choices: Toward a True Strategic Review', The National Interest (Washington), no. 47, Spring 1997; W.E. Odom, 'Transforming the Military', Foreign Affairs, vol. 76, no. 4, July-August 1997, and replies to this article in the November-December issue (vol. 76, no. 6) of the same journal.
7. For the technical arguments inevitably raised by the administration's choices, see (among others): Zalmay Khalilzad and David Ochmanek, 'Rethinking US Defence Planning', Survival (IISS, London), vol. 39, no. I, Spring 1997; D.S. Zakheim, 'Tough Choices: Toward a True Strategic Review', The National Interest (Washington), no. 47, Spring 1997; W.E. Odom, 'Transforming the Military', Foreign Affairs, vol. 76, no. 4, July-August 1997, and replies to this article in the November-December issue (vol. 76, no. 6) of the same journal.
8. National Defense University (NDU), 1997 Strategic Assessment: Flashpoints and Force Structure, INSS, Washington 1997 (www).
9. William Cohen, The Secretary's Message, in Department of Defense, Report on the QDR.
10. The last few years have seen the Pentagon more 'revolutionary' than ever before. One reason for this inflation of the word 'revolution' is the book by Kenneth Adelman (former director of the ACDA in the Reagan era) and Norman Augustine (then CEO of Martin Marietta, later CEO of Lockheed Martin), The Defense Revolution: Strategy for the Brave New World, San Francisco 1990.
11. See '1998 Military Spending: Behind the Numbers', The Defense Monitor (Washington), vol. xxvi, no. 3, June 1997.
12. See J.G. Mason, 'La République du centre: intérêts extérieurs et coalitions intérieures', in Le débat stratégique américain.
13. Adelman and Augustine, The Defense Revolution, pp. 90-99.
14. Ibid., pp. 45-76.
15. William Perry, 'Defense in an Age of Hope', Foreign Affairs, vol. 75, no. 6, November-December 1996.
16. Ibid., p. 78. Khalilzad and Ochmanek go even further than the ex-Defense Secretary. Giving the example of target-seeking anti-tank weapons - so-called 'brilliant' weapons... no doubt 'genius' ones are on the way - that hit several targets with one firing, they assert that it is now possible to think in terms of 'kills per sortie' rather than 'sorties per kill'. 'Rethinking US Defence Planning', p. 60.
17. Ibid., p. 78. Khalilzad and Ochmanek go even further than the ex-Defense Secretary. Giving the example of target-seeking anti-tank weapons - so-called 'brilliant' weapons... no doubt 'genius' ones are on the way - that hit several targets with one firing, they assert that it is now possible to think in terms of 'kills per sortie' rather than 'sorties per kill'. 'Rethinking US Defence Planning', p. 60.
18. As a New York Times editorial, quoted in the International Herald Tribune of 2 May 1997, put it: 'Pentagon spending is not the flywheel of prosperity in a $7 trillion national economy'.
19. This common-sense reasoning appears in Thomas Hobbes's Leviathan: 'The Multitude sufficient to confide in for our Security, is not determined by any certain number, but by comparison with the Enemy we feare...' London 1985, p. 224.
20. See IISS, The Military Balance 1997/98, London 1997.
21. This figure is calculated by adding the figures published in The Military Balance 1997/98. The criteria for evaluating and comparing military spending in different countries are always open to doubt, but the evolution of figures over time retains an indicative value. The general trend in relations between American military expenditure and that of the rest of the world, in the direction of increasing American preponderance, cannot be doubted.
22. For a good critique of the QDR, examining the total disproportion between the military means wielded by the us and the danger represented by declining 'rogue states', see Carl Conetta, 'Backwards Into the Future: How the QDR Prepares America for the Wrong Century', Project on Defense Alternatives, Commonwealth Institute, Cambridge, Mass., June 1997 (www).
23. In reality, the superabundant means brought into play were motivated not by any fantasized fear of Iraqi strength, but by the enormous importance to US supremacy of getting over the 'Vietnam syndrome'. The challenge had to be met without the slightest slip. What was at stake was the very credibility of us power.
24. Ronald Steel, 'A New Realism', World Policy Journal, vol. xiv, no. 2, Summer 1997, p. 8.
25. A.J. Bacevitch, 'Tradition Abandoned: America's Military in a New Era', The National Interest, no. 48, Summer 1997, p. 20.
26. Ibid.
27. It is difficult to know for certain what impression this text made on the Russians when it was first made public. What is known is that it became a favoured reference for many Western opponents of Pentagon and American supremacy, because it fitted so well with their own representation of US policy. And in fact the text made its most lasting impact on American critics, being (for example) a principal source for two recent articles in successive issues of the World Policy Journal, one on Europe and the other on Asia: Benjamin Schwarz, 'Permanent Interests, Endless Threats: Cold War Continuities and NATO Enlargement', WPJ, Fall 1997, pp. 24-30; and T.G. Carpenter, 'Washington's Smothering Strategy: American Interests in East Asia', WPJ, Winter 1997-98, pp. 20-31.
28. It is difficult to know for certain what impression this text made on the Russians when it was first made public. What is known is that it became a favoured reference for many Western opponents of Pentagon and American supremacy, because it fitted so well with their own representation of US policy. And in fact the text made its most lasting impact on American critics, being (for example) a principal source for two recent articles in successive issues of the World Policy Journal, one on Europe and the other on Asia: Benjamin Schwarz, 'Permanent Interests, Endless Threats: Cold War Continuities and NATO Enlargement', WPJ, Fall 1997, pp. 24-30; and T.G. Carpenter, 'Washington's Smothering Strategy: American Interests in East Asia', WPJ, Winter 1997-98, pp. 20-31.
29. Khalilzad and Ochmanek, 'Rethinking us Defence Planning', p. 49. The authors both know what they are talking about: Zalmay Khalilzad was Assistant Deputy Under- Secretary of Defense for Policy Planning in Washington between 1991 and 1993, and David Ochmanek Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Strategy between 1993 and 1995.
30. Department of Defense, Report on the QDR, section II.
31. NDU, 1997 Strategic Assessment. This document makes the distinction between 'theater' (reserved for Russia and China) and 'regional' (for states such as Iran, Iraq and North Korea) in a manner which clarifies the substitution of 'Major Theater Wars' for 'Major Regional Conflicts' in the QDR. This change is in conformity with the hypothesis or this essay.
32. Ibid.
33. This article, written for the annual conference on US strategy (CIRPES, EHESS) held on 20 October 1997, was largely completed when Michael Klare's article 'La nouvelle stratégie militaire des États-Unis' appeared in the November 1997 issue of Le Monde diplomatique. Our two analyses concur in emphasizing the importance given to Russia and China in American strategic thought, and we both refer to the NDU/INSS 1997 Strategic Assessment among other sources. They diverge, though, when Michael Klare views the scenario of two MRCs as matching current military capability of the US, and the Russian or Chinese threat as something brandished by people who 'think the armed forcesbudget should greatly increase'.
34. Bacevitch, 'Tradition Abandoned', p. 20.
35. William Clinton, A National Security Strategy for a New Century, The White House, Washington 1997. This document is based on the report presented in March by the President's Adviser on national security, Samuel Berger, A Foreign Policy Agenda for the Second Term, CSIS, Washington 1997 (www).
36. William Clinton, A National Security Strategy for a New Century, The White House, Washington 1997. This document is based on the report presented in March by the President's Adviser on national security, Samuel Berger, A Foreign Policy Agenda for the Second Term, CSIS, Washington 1997 (www).
37. There is nothing new about this combination, picked up by Bacevitch. It has been recurrent since the Second World War.
38. See Chikahito Harada, Russia and North-East Asia, Adelphi Paper 210, IISS, Oxford 1997, pp. 49-60.
39. Department of Defense, Report on the QDR, Section II.
40. On the circumstances surrounding this decision, see the romanticized account by Zbigniew Brzezinski and Anthony Lake, 'The Moral and Strategic Imperatives of NATO Enlargement', International Herald Tribune, 1 July 1997; and Mark Danner's analysis 'Marooned in the Cold War: America, the Alliance, and the Quest for a Vanished Wood', World Policy Journal, vol. xiv, no. 3, Fall 1997.
41. On the circumstances surrounding this decision, see the romanticized account by Zbigniew Brzezinski and Anthony Lake, 'The Moral and Strategic Imperatives of NATO Enlargement', International Herald Tribune, 1 July 1997; and Mark Danner's analysis 'Marooned in the Cold War: America, the Alliance, and the Quest for a Vanished Wood', World Policy Journal, vol. xiv, no. 3, Fall 1997.
42. On Russian policy in the Caucasus and Central Asia, see S. Frederick Starr, 'Power Failure: American Policy in the Caspian', The National Interest, no. 47, Spring 1997; Thomas Goltz, 'Catch-907 in the Caucasus', The National Interest, no. 48, Summer 1997; Vicken Cheterian, 'Grand jeu pétrolier en Transcaucasie', Le Monde diplomatique, October 1997, and from the same author an excellent account of the development of Russian policy in the Caucasus over the last ten years, Dialectics of Ethnic Conflicts and Oil Projects in the Caucasus, PSIS, Geneva 1997; see also the supplement published in Le Monde, 12 November 1997, as well as the news item by Sophie Shihab, 'Russes et Américains s'opposent sur le tracé du grand oléoduc de la Caspienne', Le Monde, 15 November 1997.
43. On Russian policy in the Caucasus and Central Asia, see S. Frederick Starr, 'Power Failure: American Policy in the Caspian', The National Interest, no. 47, Spring 1997; Thomas Goltz, 'Catch-907 in the Caucasus', The National Interest, no. 48, Summer 1997; Vicken Cheterian, 'Grand jeu pétrolier en Transcaucasie', Le Monde diplomatique, October 1997, and from the same author an excellent account of the development of Russian policy in the Caucasus over the last ten years, Dialectics of Ethnic Conflicts and Oil Projects in the Caucasus, PSIS, Geneva 1997; see also the supplement published in Le Monde, 12 November 1997, as well as the news item by Sophie Shihab, 'Russes et Américains s'opposent sur le tracé du grand oléoduc de la Caspienne', Le Monde, 15 November 1997.
44. On Russian policy in the Caucasus and Central Asia, see S. Frederick Starr, 'Power Failure: American Policy in the Caspian', The National Interest, no. 47, Spring 1997; Thomas Goltz, 'Catch-907 in the Caucasus', The National Interest, no. 48, Summer 1997; Vicken Cheterian, 'Grand jeu pétrolier en Transcaucasie', Le Monde diplomatique, October 1997, and from the same author an excellent account of the development of Russian policy in the Caucasus over the last ten years, Dialectics of Ethnic Conflicts and Oil Projects in the Caucasus, PSIS, Geneva 1997; see also the supplement published in Le Monde, 12 November 1997, as well as the news item by Sophie Shihab, 'Russes et Américains s'opposent sur le tracé du grand oléoduc de la Caspienne', Le Monde, 15 November 1997.
45. On Russian policy in the Caucasus and Central Asia, see S. Frederick Starr, 'Power Failure: American Policy in the Caspian', The National Interest, no. 47, Spring 1997; Thomas Goltz, 'Catch-907 in the Caucasus', The National Interest, no. 48, Summer 1997; Vicken Cheterian, 'Grand jeu pétrolier en Transcaucasie', Le Monde diplomatique, October 1997, and from the same author an excellent account of the development of Russian policy in the Caucasus over the last ten years, Dialectics of Ethnic Conflicts and Oil Projects in the Caucasus, PSIS, Geneva 1997; see also the supplement published in Le Monde, 12 November 1997, as well as the news item by Sophie Shihab, 'Russes et Américains s'opposent sur le tracé du grand oléoduc de la Caspienne', Le Monde, 15 November 1997.
46. On Russian policy in the Caucasus and Central Asia, see S. Frederick Starr, 'Power Failure: American Policy in the Caspian', The National Interest, no. 47, Spring 1997; Thomas Goltz, 'Catch-907 in the Caucasus', The National Interest, no. 48, Summer 1997; Vicken Cheterian, 'Grand jeu pétrolier en Transcaucasie', Le Monde diplomatique, October 1997, and from the same author an excellent account of the development of Russian policy in the Caucasus over the last ten years, Dialectics of Ethnic Conflicts and Oil Projects in the Caucasus, PSIS, Geneva 1997; see also the supplement published in Le Monde, 12 November 1997, as well as the news item by Sophie Shihab, 'Russes et Américains s'opposent sur le tracé du grand oléoduc de la Caspienne', Le Monde, 15 November 1997.
47. On Russian policy in the Caucasus and Central Asia, see S. Frederick Starr, 'Power Failure: American Policy in the Caspian', The National Interest, no. 47, Spring 1997; Thomas Goltz, 'Catch-907 in the Caucasus', The National Interest, no. 48, Summer 1997; Vicken Cheterian, 'Grand jeu pétrolier en Transcaucasie', Le Monde diplomatique, October 1997, and from the same author an excellent account of the development of Russian policy in the Caucasus over the last ten years, Dialectics of Ethnic Conflicts and Oil Projects in the Caucasus, PSIS, Geneva 1997; see also the supplement published in Le Monde, 12 November 1997, as well as the news item by Sophie Shihab, 'Russes et Américains s'opposent sur le tracé du grand oléoduc de la Caspienne', Le Monde, 15 November 1997.
48. On the recent history of Russo-American rivalries in this part of the world, see Cheterian, 'Grand jeu pétrolier en Transcaucasie', as well as Newsweek, 12 May 1997.
49. See 'Azerbaijani Oil Gathers Clout in US', International Herald Tribune, 7 July 1997.
50. On the signature in Washington of two important oil contracts by the Kazakh President on 19 November, see Le Monde, 21 November 1997.
51. See Zbigniew Brzezinski, Brent Scowcroft and Richard Murphy, 'Differentiated Containment', and Graham Fuller and Ian Lesser, 'Persian Gulf Myths', in Foreign Affairs, vol. 76, no. 3, May-June 1997. The first article affirms: 'One negative consequence of current policy is the damage inflicted on America's interest in gaining greater access to the energy sources of Central Asia' (p. 28), adding that American government opposition to American oil company activity in Iran helped nobody but Total. The second article says in a similar vein: 'Flat rejection of pipelines through Iranian territory - which, for practical reasons, most of the region's states and many oil companies would prefer - opens the way to Russian monopoly' (p. 48). See also S. Frederick Starr, who says that the American policy of isolating Iran 'is having a disastrous impact on Central Asia and Azerbaijan by denying to them the obvious outlet for their oil and gas and forcing them into Russia's arms' ('Power Failure', p. 29).
52. See Zbigniew Brzezinski, Brent Scowcroft and Richard Murphy, 'Differentiated Containment', and Graham Fuller and Ian Lesser, 'Persian Gulf Myths', in Foreign Affairs, vol. 76, no. 3, May-June 1997. The first article affirms: 'One negative consequence of current policy is the damage inflicted on America's interest in gaining greater access to the energy sources of Central Asia' (p. 28), adding that American government opposition to American oil company activity in Iran helped nobody but Total. The second article says in a similar vein: 'Flat rejection of pipelines through Iranian territory - which, for practical reasons, most of the region's states and many oil companies would prefer - opens the way to Russian monopoly' (p. 48). See also S. Frederick Starr, who says that the American policy of isolating Iran 'is having a disastrous impact on Central Asia and Azerbaijan by denying to them the obvious outlet for their oil and gas and forcing them into Russia's arms' ('Power Failure', p. 29).
53. See Zbigniew Brzezinski, Brent Scowcroft and Richard Murphy, 'Differentiated Containment', and Graham Fuller and Ian Lesser, 'Persian Gulf Myths', in Foreign Affairs, vol. 76, no. 3, May-June 1997. The first article affirms: 'One negative consequence of current policy is the damage inflicted on America's interest in gaining greater access to the energy sources of Central Asia' (p. 28), adding that American government opposition to American oil company activity in Iran helped nobody but Total. The second article says in a similar vein: 'Flat rejection of pipelines through Iranian territory - which, for practical reasons, most of the region's states and many oil companies would prefer - opens the way to Russian monopoly' (p. 48). See also S. Frederick Starr, who says that the American policy of isolating Iran 'is having a disastrous impact on Central Asia and Azerbaijan by denying to them the obvious outlet for their oil and gas and forcing them into Russia's arms' ('Power Failure', p. 29).
54. See James Schlesinger, 'Fragmentation and Hubris: A Shaky Basis for American Leadership', in The National Interest, no. 49, Fall 1997. This vigorous protest points out, among other things, that President Clinton chose, unusually, to announce the strengthening of American sanctions against Iran in a speech delivered before the World Jewish Congress in New York (p. 5).
55. See Éric Leser, 'Les manoeuvres de Téhéran pour acquérir l'arme nucléaire', Le Monde, 1 October 1997.
56. For a frank expression of Russian irritation over what Moscow perceives as an attack on its vital interests and its security, see Nicolai A. Kovalsky, 'Russia and Mediterranean Security', in Mediterranean Security at the Crossroads, special issue of Mediterranean Quarterly (Washington), vol. 8, no. 2, Spring 1997. For a clear exposé of American policy on the southern flank of NATO and its eastward extension, see in the same collection W. Bruce Weinrod, 'The US, NATO, and the Mediterranean Region in the Twenty-First Century'. See also remarks by Admiral Joseph Lopez, American commander of allied forces in southern Europe, in 'Is NATO's Southern Flank Exposed?', International Herald Tribune, 20 May 1997. The arguments presented by Weinrod, who was vice-deputy to the Secretary of Defense for Europe and NATO under George Bush's presidency, and by Admiral Lopez, explain the American intransigence in the face of the French demand to have the NATO southern command entrusted to a European.
57. For a frank expression of Russian irritation over what Moscow perceives as an attack on its vital interests and its security, see Nicolai A. Kovalsky, 'Russia and Mediterranean Security', in Mediterranean Security at the Crossroads, special issue of Mediterranean Quarterly (Washington), vol. 8, no. 2, Spring 1997. For a clear exposé of American policy on the southern flank of NATO and its eastward extension, see in the same collection W. Bruce Weinrod, 'The US, NATO, and the Mediterranean Region in the Twenty-First Century'. See also remarks by Admiral Joseph Lopez, American commander of allied forces in southern Europe, in 'Is NATO's Southern Flank Exposed?', International Herald Tribune, 20 May 1997. The arguments presented by Weinrod, who was vice-deputy to the Secretary of Defense for Europe and NATO under George Bush's presidency, and by Admiral Lopez, explain the American intransigence in the face of the French demand to have the NATO southern command entrusted to a European.
58. For a frank expression of Russian irritation over what Moscow perceives as an attack on its vital interests and its security, see Nicolai A. Kovalsky, 'Russia and Mediterranean Security', in Mediterranean Security at the Crossroads, special issue of Mediterranean Quarterly (Washington), vol. 8, no. 2, Spring 1997. For a clear exposé of American policy on the southern flank of NATO and its eastward extension, see in the same collection W. Bruce Weinrod, 'The US, NATO, and the Mediterranean Region in the Twenty-First Century'. See also remarks by Admiral Joseph Lopez, American commander of allied forces in southern Europe, in 'Is NATO's Southern Flank Exposed?', International Herald Tribune, 20 May 1997. The arguments presented by Weinrod, who was vice-deputy to the Secretary of Defense for Europe and NATO under George Bush's presidency, and by Admiral Lopez, explain the American intransigence in the face of the French demand to have the NATO southern command entrusted to a European.
59. It is also the case that START II would be very costly to Russia if it had to replace its multi-warhead ICBMs with single-warhead missiles - this is why the Clinton administration proposed START III to Moscow before START II had even been ratified.
60. Alexei K. Pushkov, 'Don't Isolate Us: A Russian View of NATO Expansion', The National Interest, no. 47, Spring 1997, p. 62.
61. After these lines were written, the International Herald Tribune of 8 December 1997 published two articles from the Washington Post confirming these tendencies. One concerns a CIA report to the American Senate revealing the pressure being exerted in Moscow to give a larger role to nuclear weapons in Russian strategy, and even to develop options for first-strike and 'limited' use. The other reports on a secret directive from President Clinton (Presidential Decision Directive, PDD) containing a major revision of us nuclear doctrine, abandoning the insensate objective of 'victory' in a prolonged nuclear war (contained in the previous PDD signed by President Reagan in 1981) and falling back on a strictly deterrent posture, better adapted to the nuclear weapons reduction objectives advanced during the negotiations for START III.
62. Pushkov, 'Don't Isolate Us', p. 62.
63. Boris Yeltsin himself is a good deal less appreciated, paradoxically, than Gorbachev used to be. See Peter Rutland, 'Yeltsin: The Problem, Not the Solution', which dubs him a 'Potemkin President', The National Interest, no. 49, Fall 1997, p. 38.
64. For an analysis of that weakness, see Sherman Garnett, 'Russia's Illusory Ambitions', Foreign Affairs, vol. 76, no. 2, March-April 1997.
65. Richard Pipes, Foreign Affairs, vol. 76, No 5, September-October 1997.
66. The Washington oracle Henry Kissinger, asked by Newsweek to describe the future, said, 'Early in the new century, after many ups and downs, Russia is likely to have restored its central authority. It may well be closer to the political structures favoured by Pinochet or Salazar than to a Western pluralistic system - though it will be freer than Communism'. 'A World We Have Not Known', Newsweek, 27 January 1997.
67. To see the decision to expand NATO as having been dictated by the arms lobby is clearly too reductionist, even though arms industry interests are real enough and have played a part in the process. See 'US Arms Makers Lobby For NATO Expansion', International Herald Tribune, 30 June 1997.
68. Brzezinski and Lake, 'NATO Enlargement'.
69. The security-based argument directed against Russian ambitions in Europe explains in particular, the strong German support for the principle of NATO expansion, so strong that it is backed by an overwhelming majority in the Bundestag, Greens included. The third argument of Brzezinski and Lake addresses the democratization of the countries concerned. It will only convince those who really want to believe that belonging to NATO is a measure of democracy in itself.
70. Written responses from the administration to questions from Senator Hutchinson and nineteen other senators, in 'The Debate Over NATO Expansion', Arms Control Today (Washington), vol. 27, no. 6, September 1997, p. 3.
71. George Bunn, Robert Bowie, David Calleo et al., An Open Letter to President Bill Clinton.
72. Two days after the announcement on 14 May that an agreement between the Boris Yeltsin administration and NATO was about to be signed, the IMF unblocked a tranche of nearly $700 million, held back for some time out of a total credit to Russia of $10 billion over three years. At the same time the Russian government started to negotiate a steep increase in its EU borrowings over the 1996 level. These economic accompaniments to the expansion of NATO have generated the view in the US that the Yeltsin administration's conciliatory attitude resulted from the need to finance economic interests - energy interests for the most part - which predominate in Moscow (see 'NATO and Russia: The Gazprom Factor', International Herald Tribune, 27 May 1997). It is an irony of history that this is an exact reflection of the explanation that used to be given for US foreign policy choices in the Soviet Union. The fact is however that hydrocarbons-sector interests weigh even more heavily on Russia than they ever did (or do) on the US.
73. A lucid Boris Yeltsin said of the accords with NATO that 'their success will depend on their application'.
74. Extracts from 'The NATO-Russia Founding Act' published in Le Monde, 28 May 1997.
75. Russia wants the frontiers between member states of the CIS to remain unmarked, as they were in the Soviet Union, and for its own troops to be directly involved in the defence of all the Community's external frontiers.
76. The request was repeated at Vilnius (Lithuania) on 5 September 1997.
77. James Sherr, 'Russia-Ukraine Rapprochement?: The Black Sea Fleet Accords', Survival, vol. 39, no. 3, Autumn 1997. The author gives a detailed analysis of the content of the Russia-Ukraine accords.
78. Within the limits of the divide-and-rule principle. Thus for example, Russia has no interest in a peaceful settlement of the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan over Nagorno-Karabakh, since this would raise the possibility of Baku oil reaching the Black Sea through Armenian and Turkish territory, thus escaping Russian control.
79. Richard Bernstein and Ross H. Munro, The Coming Conflict with China, New York 1997. See also, by the same authors, 'The Coming Conflict with America', Foreign Affairs, vol. 76, no. 2, March-April 1997, in which they expose their main theories in the framework of the China debate.
80. Richard Bernstein and Ross H. Munro, The Coming Conflict with China, New York 1997. See also, by the same authors, 'The Coming Conflict with America', Foreign Affairs, vol. 76, no. 2, March-April 1997, in which they expose their main theories in the framework of the China debate.
81. Bernstein and Munro, 'The Coming Conflict with America', p. 30.
82. See the news story by Philippe Pons, Le Monde of 4 September 1997, as well as the article by the Singapore official Kishore Mahbubani, 'An Asia-Pacific Consensus', Foreign Affairs, vol. 76, no. 5, September-October 1997. On the Japanese debate over China and the treaty with the us, see Selig S. Harrison, 'L'alliance américano-japonaise cimentée', Le Monde diplomatique, November 1997. On the worried reaction of the Chinese to the revision of the Japan-US treaty, see James Chace, 'Taming the Tiger: Report from the Middle Kingdom', World Policy Journal, vol. xiv, no. 4, Winter 1997-98.
83. See the news story by Philippe Pons, Le Monde of 4 September 1997, as well as the article by the Singapore official Kishore Mahbubani, 'An Asia-Pacific Consensus', Foreign Affairs, vol. 76, no. 5, September-October 1997. On the Japanese debate over China and the treaty with the us, see Selig S. Harrison, 'L'alliance américano-japonaise cimentée', Le Monde diplomatique, November 1997. On the worried reaction of the Chinese to the revision of the Japan-US treaty, see James Chace, 'Taming the Tiger: Report from the Middle Kingdom', World Policy Journal, vol. xiv, no. 4, Winter 1997-98.
84. See the news story by Philippe Pons, Le Monde of 4 September 1997, as well as the article by the Singapore official Kishore Mahbubani, 'An Asia-Pacific Consensus', Foreign Affairs, vol. 76, no. 5, September-October 1997. On the Japanese debate over China and the treaty with the us, see Selig S. Harrison, 'L'alliance américano-japonaise cimentée', Le Monde diplomatique, November 1997. On the worried reaction of the Chinese to the revision of the Japan-US treaty, see James Chace, 'Taming the Tiger: Report from the Middle Kingdom', World Policy Journal, vol. xiv, no. 4, Winter 1997-98.
85. See the news story by Philippe Pons, Le Monde of 4 September 1997, as well as the article by the Singapore official Kishore Mahbubani, 'An Asia-Pacific Consensus', Foreign Affairs, vol. 76, no. 5, September-October 1997. On the Japanese debate over China and the treaty with the us, see Selig S. Harrison, 'L'alliance américano-japonaise cimentée', Le Monde diplomatique, November 1997. On the worried reaction of the Chinese to the revision of the Japan-US treaty, see James Chace, 'Taming the Tiger: Report from the Middle Kingdom', World Policy Journal, vol. xiv, no. 4, Winter 1997-98.
86. For an overall view of these disputes and their links with energy and military questions, see Mark J. Valencia, 'Energy and Insecurity in Asia', Survival, vol. 39, no. 3, Autumn 1997.
87. See Susan Willett, 'East Asia's Changing Defence Industry', Survival, vol. 39, no. 3, Autumn 1997.
88. 'The collapse of the Soviet Union removed China's main regional security threat and increased, virtually overnight, China's comparative power in Asia'. Bernstein and Munro, 'The Coming Conflict with America', p. 23.
89. A.D. McLennan, 'Balance, Not Containment: A Geopolitical Take from Canberra', The National Interest, no. 49, Fall 1997, p. 54.
90. Ibid., p. 56.
91. Leon V. Sigal, 'Who Is Fighting Peace in Korea? An Undiplomatic History', World Policy Journal, vol. xiv, no. 2, Summer 1997, p. 45.
92. On the North Korean menace seen from Japan, see Harrison, 'L'alliance américano-japonaise cimentée'.
93. Bernstein and Munro, 'The Coming Conflict with America', p. 19.
94. For a contrary view about China see Lu Ning, The Dynamics of Foreign-Policy Decision- making in China, Boulder 1997, which says that the Chinese army is subordinate to the civilian political leadership in foreign policy matters.
95. Bernstein and Munro, 'The Coming Conflict with America', p. 29. Compare Henry Kissinger's forecast on Russia cited above in footnote 51.
96. Robert S. Ross has defended friendly relations with China in the above-mentioned special issues: 'Beijing as a Conservative Power', Foreign Affairs, vol. 76, no. 2, March-April 1997, and 'Why Our Hardliners Are Wrong', The National Interest, no. 49, Fall 1997. See also, from the same author in collaboration with Andrew J. Nathan, The Great Wall and the Empty Fortress: China's Search for Security, New York 1997. See also, in the same vein, Ezra F. Vogel, ed., Living with China: US-China Relations in the Twenty-First Century, New York 1997. And in an even more apologetic register, see Thomas A. Metzger and Ramon H. Myers, Greater China and US Foreign Policy: The Choice between Confrontation and Mutual Respect, Stanford 1996.
97. Robert S. Ross has defended friendly relations with China in the above-mentioned special issues: 'Beijing as a Conservative Power', Foreign Affairs, vol. 76, no. 2, March-April 1997, and 'Why Our Hardliners Are Wrong', The National Interest, no. 49, Fall 1997. See also, from the same author in collaboration with Andrew J. Nathan, The Great Wall and the Empty Fortress: China's Search for Security, New York 1997. See also, in the same vein, Ezra F. Vogel, ed., Living with China: US-China Relations in the Twenty-First Century, New York 1997. And in an even more apologetic register, see Thomas A. Metzger and Ramon H. Myers, Greater China and US Foreign Policy: The Choice between Confrontation and Mutual Respect, Stanford 1996.
98. Robert S. Ross has defended friendly relations with China in the above-mentioned special issues: 'Beijing as a Conservative Power', Foreign Affairs, vol. 76, no. 2, March-April 1997, and 'Why Our Hardliners Are Wrong', The National Interest, no. 49, Fall 1997. See also, from the same author in collaboration with Andrew J. Nathan, The Great Wall and the Empty Fortress: China's Search for Security, New York 1997. See also, in the same vein, Ezra F. Vogel, ed., Living with China: US-China Relations in the Twenty-First Century, New York 1997. And in an even more apologetic register, see Thomas A. Metzger and Ramon H. Myers, Greater China and US Foreign Policy: The Choice between Confrontation and Mutual Respect, Stanford 1996.
99. Robert S. Ross has defended friendly relations with China in the above-mentioned special issues: 'Beijing as a Conservative Power', Foreign Affairs, vol. 76, no. 2, March-April 1997, and 'Why Our Hardliners Are Wrong', The National Interest, no. 49, Fall 1997. See also, from the same author in collaboration with Andrew J. Nathan, The Great Wall and the Empty Fortress: China's Search for Security, New York 1997. See also, in the same vein, Ezra F. Vogel, ed., Living with China: US-China Relations in the Twenty-First Century, New York 1997. And in an even more apologetic register, see Thomas A. Metzger and Ramon H. Myers, Greater China and US Foreign Policy: The Choice between Confrontation and Mutual Respect, Stanford 1996.
100. Robert S. Ross has defended friendly relations with China in the above-mentioned special issues: 'Beijing as a Conservative Power', Foreign Affairs, vol. 76, no. 2, March-April 1997, and 'Why Our Hardliners Are Wrong', The National Interest, no. 49, Fall 1997. See also, from the same author in collaboration with Andrew J. Nathan, The Great Wall and the Empty Fortress: China's Search for Security, New York 1997. See also, in the same vein, Ezra F. Vogel, ed., Living with China: US-China Relations in the Twenty-First Century, New York 1997. And in an even more apologetic register, see Thomas A. Metzger and Ramon H. Myers, Greater China and US Foreign Policy: The Choice between Confrontation and Mutual Respect, Stanford 1996.
101. See the news story by Laurent Zecchini, Le Monde, 31 October 1997.
102. Ross, 'Beijing as a Conservative Power', p. 44. Ross's line on Beijing is basically identical to the one traditionally defended by Henry Kissinger. For a summary of the former Secretary of State's arguments on this subject, see his article, 'Outrage Is Not a Policy', Newsweek, 10 November 1997.
103. Ross, 'Beijing as a Conservative Power', p. 44. Ross's line on Beijing is basically identical to the one traditionally defended by Henry Kissinger. For a summary of the former Secretary of State's arguments on this subject, see his article, 'Outrage Is Not a Policy', Newsweek, 10 November 1997.
104. Zbigniew Brzezinski, 'A Geostrategy for Eurasia', Foreign Affairs, vol. 76, no. 5, September-October 1997, p. 62, summarizing the main themes of his last book The Grand Chessboard: American Primacy and its Geostrategic Imperatives, New York 1997.
105. Zbigniew Brzezinski, 'A Geostrategy for Eurasia', Foreign Affairs, vol. 76, no. 5, September-October 1997, p. 62, summarizing the main themes of his last book The Grand Chessboard: American Primacy and its Geostrategic Imperatives, New York 1997.
106. See Valencia, 'Energy and Insecurity in Asia'. Development of these fields requires big financial and technological means which only Japan has in the region. Hence Boris Yeltsin's charm offensive in Tokyo, with a promise made at the Yeltsin-Hashimoto summit on 1 and 2 November 1997 to settle the dispute over the Kuril islands before 2000 with a decision favouring the Japanese claims. In the same area, Russia is very anxious to restore and stiffen its dominance in central Asia, exploitation of its eastern oil and gas fields being in competition with the project for transporting gas from Turkmenistan into East Asia (the Energy Silk Route).
107. The Russian atomic energy minister, Viktor Mikhailov, declared in Beijing that the United States is doing all it can in China to marginalize Russia'. See Sophie Shihab, Le Monde, 31 October 1997.
108. For a description of these meetings see Harada, Russia and North-East Asia, pp. 37-48.
109. Incidentally, the Chinese President concluded a 'constructive strategic partnership' with his American opposite number during his visit to the us in October 1997, reducing the relative importance of the Sino-Russian accords in the context of the transactions concluded with Washington. The fact remains however that only the first 'partnership' contains a genuine military dimension.
110. Josef Joffe, 'How America Does It', Foreign Affairs, vol. 76, no. 5, September-October 1997, p. 25.
111. Ibid., pp. 19ff. Josef Joffe had already developed the same theory in '"Bismarck" or "Britain"? Toward an American Grand Strategy After Bipolarity', International Security, Spring 1995.
112. Ibid., pp. 19ff. Josef Joffe had already developed the same theory in '"Bismarck" or "Britain"? Toward an American Grand Strategy After Bipolarity', International Security, Spring 1995.
113. Joffe, 'How America Does It', pp. 20-21.
114. Edward N. Luttwak, 'Strategy', in Robert Cowley and Geoffrey Parker, eds, The Reader's Companion to Military History, New York 1996, p. 451.
115. The 1979 American commitment on Taiwan holds that any non-peaceful pressure to change the status of Taiwan would constitute a threat to peace in the region, and would involve the US.
116. Edward N. Luttwak, 'A Post-Heroic Military Policy', Foreign Affairs, vol. 75, no. 4, July-August 1996.
117. The Taiwan Strait and the Russo-Ukraine border are the most dangerous spots on the planet, the two places where wars between and among great powers could erupt in the post-Cold War period, Michael Mandelbaum affirms in 'Westernizing Russia and China', Foreign Affairs, vol. 76, no. 3, May-June 1997, p. 89. We might add what Fred Coleman calls the 'Kaliningrad scenario', an invasion of Lithuania by Russian tanks to ensure the corridor between Russia and the Russian military base at Kaliningrad on the Baltic Sea, in response to a decision to incorporate the Baltic countries into NATO. See 'The Kaliningrad Scenario: Expanding NATO to the Baltics', World Policy Journal, vol. xiv, no. 3, Fall 1997.
118. The Taiwan Strait and the Russo-Ukraine border are the most dangerous spots on the planet, the two places where wars between and among great powers could erupt in the post-Cold War period, Michael Mandelbaum affirms in 'Westernizing Russia and China', Foreign Affairs, vol. 76, no. 3, May-June 1997, p. 89. We might add what Fred Coleman calls the 'Kaliningrad scenario', an invasion of Lithuania by Russian tanks to ensure the corridor between Russia and the Russian military base at Kaliningrad on the Baltic Sea, in response to a decision to incorporate the Baltic countries into NATO. See 'The Kaliningrad Scenario: Expanding NATO to the Baltics', World Policy Journal, vol. xiv, no. 3, Fall 1997.
119. Department of Defense, Report on the QDR, section II (my emphasis).