Interview with Leonid Ivashov, President of the Academy of Geopolitical Problems.
"TOMORROW". Leonid G., how do you assess the current, medium-term and long-term threats to Russia from the point of view of geopolitics?
Leonid IVASHOV. Before giving such an assessment, it is necessary to understand what happened to the world after the destruction of the Soviet Union. In my opinion, this is a milestone separating the two historical and geopolitical eras.
Together with the destruction of the USSR, the system of international collective security, which was formed as a result of the Second World War and operated for almost half a century, was virtually destroyed, with the exception of individual "islands". Since its foundations were laid already at the final stage of the war, during the negotiations of the “Big Three”, that is, Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill, it is customary to call it Yalta-Potsdam. This system was universal - primarily because almost all the peoples of the world experienced the calamities of the Second World War, and there was a general desire to make the world safer.
Of course, good personal relations between Roosevelt and Stalin also played a big role in shaping this system. It is difficult to say what influenced the position of the President of the United States, but judging from the memories of his son, Roosevelt and some of the western elite had a sense of guilt for starting two world wars.
The third moment, which played a crucial role in creating a universal system of international collective security, is a qualitative change in the geopolitical structure of the world. For the first time since the 16th century, it lost the property of “Eurocentricity”, since the leading European countries: Great Britain, Germany, France, Italy — were extremely weakened by the war. And the geopolitical structure of the world was already formed on a different principle: the centers of power moved to the American and Eurasian continents. At the same time, the two poles (USSR and USA) can be considered equal in size, since, with such estimates, in my opinion, one cannot take into account only the ratio of material forces. Yes, compared to the USSR, the Americans earned much more in World War II, having managed to quickly "unleash" their economy, their military power. But the cultural-civilizational, spiritual and spatial factor of the USSR was incomparably higher than the American one. This was manifested in the Victory 1945 of the year, and in the launch of the first artificial satellite of the Earth, and in the flight of Yuri Gagarin.
"TOMORROW". The opinion is often expressed that these advantages were largely lost after Khrushchev’s speech at the 20th Congress of the CPSU and the Caribbean crisis of 1962, when the Americans publicly caught the Kremlin in lying about the presence of Soviet missiles in Cuba.
L.I. The geopolitical consequences of these shares affected very quickly and continue to affect today. But this did not affect the potential of our country as such, but the effectiveness of the use of this potential.
But, in addition to the "bipolar world", the two superpowers, with the victory of the communists in China, the "third pole" of world geopolitics began to take shape.
In 50 — the beginning of 60 — the colonial system collapsed, which existed and developed for several centuries, resulting in a huge “third world” that combined and selected for itself a middle path between capitalism and socialism. And this "third world", in spite of all its looseness and apparent structurelessness, nevertheless, additionally balanced the mutual threats of the two above-mentioned main poles. For example, armed conflicts took place exclusively in the territories of the Third World. For Americans, Vietnam has become a symbol of military-political failure, and for the Soviet Union, Afghanistan. By 1979, almost the entire Islamic world was on our side, supporting us, above all - in connection with the position of the USSR in the Arab-Israeli conflict. But when we entered Afghanistan in December, a significant part of the Islamic world distanced itself from the USSR. That is, it was a very big and important regulator.
Such a “three-pole” geopolitical model made it possible to create a universal security system under the auspices of the UN. For the first time in the history of mankind, a supranational body, the United Nations Security Council with huge powers, has been created on the entire planet. A military headquarters committee was created, and then - lower level - regional security structures began to form, and even lower - national security systems.
Such a world even had a good structural perspective. The Americans launched a blocking system of opposition. We responded first with an alliance with China in response to the creation of NATO (the signing of 1949, the Great Union Treaty with the Republic of China, and in 1955, the Warsaw Treaty with the seven socialist countries of Eastern Europe).
This bloc system in some way deformed the international security system, and those structures that were created by the United States, other than NATO (SEATO, CENTO, etc.), did not receive serious development.
By the beginning of 80's, the geopolitical system looked stable and seemed to be in no danger. But with the collapse of the USSR, the entire system of international security collapsed. It was a surprise for Americans. After all, when overseas talking about their victory in the Cold War, it was a strange and even stupid victory.
Thanks to the largely contrived "Soviet threat", the United States helped both the West and a large part of the world to use all its resources in the face of global competition, which we called "the peaceful coexistence of two socio-political systems." They united the world. And the fact that Europeans began to live better, that the "Marshall Plan" has earned; that the negros were recognized as full-fledged citizens of the United States — all this happened under pressure from the Soviet Union, improving the lives of our workers and collective farmers, our intelligentsia. The competition went on in all branches of life: in educational, cultural and spiritual, etc. For example, after the launch of the satellite, the whole world, including the countries of the West, went to study with us, since the Soviet education system was recognized as the best in the world.
Americans for almost a century and a half dreamed of world domination. Roosevelt played with Stalin against Churchill, in order to destroy the British Empire, which prevented them from dominating on a planetary scale. So, for a century and a half, they dreamed about it, did everything to become "state number one", and when it happened after the collapse of the USSR, they were catastrophically unprepared for this desired role.
They have not even developed a theory of a unipolar world order. The Americans wanted to dominate, but did not know how to build a control system in the absence of a geopolitical "sparring partner." Even such naive developments as the "end of history" of Francis Fukuyama appeared only a year after the destruction of the Soviet Union.
In order to control the world, you need to have three interrelated factors: economic power, superiority of military power and cultural and civilizational superiority. If Americans have the first two factors and they successfully operate with them, then they lose cultural and civilizational superiority year after year. Yes, Hollywood. Yes, the Internet. But these are technologies that are not connected with meanings, with values. India has its own Bollywood, China has its own Internet. Americans cannot become global leaders in the cultural and spiritual realm. On some information technologies here you will not leave. These guns can shoot in any direction, that's the problem. A life where the power of money dominates, where the meaning of life is hoarding, is not perceived either by the East or Latin America. In general, the world did not follow the Americans. And Russia, in general, is coming. And this, in my opinion, is the main threat to our national security. From which they proceed and with which, as with the center, all other threats are connected.
"TOMORROW". This is a very original and unexpected approach to the problem of the national security of our country.
L.I. Since the end of 40-s, not only US government structures, but above all economic and financial structures, have begun to master the world space. After all, what is it: make a dollar in 1944 a world currency and give it into private hands? Private banks and investment corporations immediately occupied the entire financial space, became the masters of the world. Not the American president with the US armed forces, but they. There were powerful transnational corporations (TNCs). They started from the territory of America, having almost unlimited access to dollar emissions. And thanks to this, today, in fact, privatized the entire world market. And the states in this situation have lost their former significance.
But the entire international legal system, including the international security system, was formed on the basis of sovereign states. Both the UN and all its structures were formed precisely as an association of sovereign states. And now the states are losing their usual role, losing their foreign policy positions, international legal subjectivity and starting to fit into the global financial system, where private capital dominates, and generally into the global economy - in the second, subordinate roles.
Russia, remaining "just" a state - even with a nuclear arsenal capable of destroying all life on Earth, and with a veto in the UN Security Council - will inevitably lose competition with transnational corporations. Today’s chances of survival are not states, but civilizations.
We, having entered into the global financial system, using the dollar for payments not only outside, but also inside the country, signed the death sentence to ourselves, to our subjectivity. Today, Russia as a state can no longer play a strong role in the United Nations, since the UN itself, as an intergovernmental structure, largely fulfills the will of TNCs, becoming their foreign policy tool.
Let's see what our economy is based on today. It is clear - on the money. But the ruble is “tied” not to real production, not to the real volume of our resources, not even to our plans for the production and consumption of goods and services, but to the American dollar. Here we are all the time and "jump" for this American dollar. We do not have our own currency, which was under the Soviet Union - we have rubles as secondary substitutes for US dollars. And this loss of our independence in the financial and economic sphere entails a loss of independence and initiatives in politics, in ensuring our security.
Arnold Toynbee, the great British historian, not particularly respected in the West, came to the conclusion, speaking about the paradigm of human development, that humanity develops due to some kind of threat, some kind of challenge. Our mind seeks and finds some answer to this challenge.
Now we need to find an answer to the challenge of transnational big capital, who has subdued the US state power, and through it the power of most other countries of the world. I repeat: states as such can no longer confront these transnational structures. And we see the exit to the world stage of civilizations as cultural-historical super-societies of people. In 1869, our distinguished compatriot Nikolai Yakovlevich Danilevsky said: "At the theater of world history, the main characters are not ethnic groups and states, but cultural historical types that are in the heyday of becoming civilization." And this thesis Danilevsky today begins to work. We see that the Chinese of all countries of the world, having understood this, united and became who they are today. Having ceased to be capitalists, socialists, etc. India, the European Union, is following the same path, looking for its civilizational identity in the Bolivarian initiative of Latin America, seeking to secede from the two hundred year rule of the United States and their TNCs. We see how a civilizational project, around which it is possible to unite, was planted to the Islamic world through the Salafis. Gaddafi tried to form the African Union and was destroyed ...
"TOMORROW". That is, the concept of the “war of civilizations” put forward by Samuel Huntington is fully consistent with the real state of affairs? And Putin, in advancing the project of Eurasian integration in the post-Soviet space, is essentially trying to form a Eurasian civilization?
L.I. Yes of course. Trying to remain "only" a state and not a civilization, we will be destroyed. We will no longer be the subject of world progress. We, with all our gigantic potential, are simply dragged to pieces by other civilizations and TNCs.
There are other threats as well. They, too, have objectively formed. For example, we know the nature of capital. That he is constantly looking for resources for production and markets for the realization of his goods and services. When the states of politics, interstate formations were subjects of world politics, it was possible to capture some resources and markets with the help of war. And today the world financial and economic system has covered the whole world, and it is possible to look for new markets only on other planets. Therefore, there is a struggle for the redistribution of existing markets - and mostly not by military means.
"TOMORROW". But what about the US aggression in Iraq and Afghanistan, in general in the Middle East, where they launched the "Arab Spring"?
L.I. There we are not talking about markets, but about resources. TNCs are trying to save on resources and at the same time force competing civilizations, such as China, for example, to pay more for them. At the same time, they are encouraging the Salafi project, so that Islam becomes the enemy of Russia, that Russia competes with Islamic countries for the right to sell its hydrocarbons on foreign markets. If we take the path of confrontation, oil and gas will be taken away from us at one fine moment. The same will be done with Muslims, with Saudi Arabia and the monarchies of the Persian Gulf - there is nothing new here, the typical imperial policy "Divide and rule!"
"TOMORROW". In other words, Leonid Grigorievich, do you think that the main current and future threats for Russia are non-military in nature?
L.I. I will ask you another question. And how was the Soviet Union destroyed? With threats of a military or non-military character? The Soviet Army could, on orders, destroy any adversary. But she didn’t make a single shot when the state that created this army was destroyed. In the USA, they are well aware that it is best to neutralize Russian missiles not by preventive strikes with precision weapons, and having made it so that no one in our country even had a thought to press the start button. This is the first.
The second one. On January 18, 2003, George W. Bush signed a directive that was somehow ignored: the concept of an instant global strike. Its essence is the development of high-precision conventional strategic weapons. And for 4-6 hours they simulated at the command-and-staff games, is it possible to strike a blow to any country in the world with non-nuclear high-precision means and paralyze the response of this country? They argue there: which objects to destroy in the first place, and which - in the second. Of course, it is indisputable that, first of all, our strategic missile control points fall in. They must be destroyed or suppressed by electronic means, such attempts have already been repeatedly recorded by us in the area of Plesetsk, in the area of the North fleet.
With further strikes, a country left without protection and without the ability to strike back, I can simply systematically embed in the Stone Age, like Yugoslavia, disable all life support systems, and then present an ultimatum. And if the country does not give up after that, then strike with partial use of tactical nuclear weapons. Something like this military concept they have today.
"TOMORROW". This concept was partially implemented not only in Yugoslavia, but also in Iraq and Libya, and today it is being implemented in Syria?
L.I. No, there is a slightly different war. We also did not pay attention to the fact that George W. Bush, the US president, at the very beginning of 2002, against the background of the September 11 attacks, when he needed to finally finish off the old international security system, announced the transition of the United States to preventive action. We did not even understand at first what it is. And behind this statement is very much. And the disciplined state structure of America. She immediately began to act. What it is? It is not easy to deliver a preemptive strike at the enemy who has been prepared for war. There have been many examples in history when such strikes, despite the effect achieved, did not lead to the intended goals. Here is a different concept. Its essence lies in a certain sequence of actions. The first is the overthrow of the current government in one country or another. Secondly, the replacement of this government by representatives of the pro-American elite. Only such a US government will be considered democratic by the whole world, even if no citizen of the country voted for it. And the third is the repopulation of this country. Moreover, the term "reshuffling" does not imply that some should simply be expelled from their territory, while others should be let in there, although this is not excluded and welcome. This means above all the cultural and civilization reprogramming of the population. From it, a whole set of measures should erase all national — above all, national pride, national history, tie this new population to the “dollar empire”. So that people would think not about their ancestors and descendants, but about why they should buy a flat cake, clothes, cars, and so on. At first, these measures were worked out by American strategists in practice, and now, summarizing the practice, they put theory under it. And the practice happened at them just on the territory of Russia. They replaced the elite, introduced the “fifth column” into power, and already through all the information channels it began to introduce “its own”, that is, pro-American values.
"TOMORROW". It turns out that the huge US military machine also plays a subordinate, supporting role?
L.I. Her task - to serve the "empire of the dollar." The American navy, the American air and space forces literally “saddled” all the transport and trade communications of the modern world. Their goal - to make so that no international transaction, whether it is a trade, financial, or any other - is under control and can be interrupted at any time by any means.
All banks, all large and small corporations of the world, each of us pays taxes on the maintenance of this global machine of control and suppression.
"TOMORROW". But what about the noble Somali pirates, for example? Are they also part of this control and suppression machine?
L.I. I'm pretty sure that it is. If from space you can see and confidently position objects the size of a small watermelon, then what pirates can we talk about? They are all in full view. And if they are given to do their business, it means that there are certain reasons.
"TOMORROW". Are the elements of chaos and chance, failure in communication and control systems completely excluded?
L.I. Of course not, but they are not decisive, and if we are talking about some kind of sustainable geopolitical phenomenon, then it somehow interacts with the control and management system built by modern global capital.
"TOMORROW". So, in your opinion, Leonid Grigorievich, it is necessary to do Russia and the country's political leadership in order to effectively ensure national security?
L.I. First of all - to be a civilization. Russian civilization or Eurasian civilization is a difficult and painful question for us today, and it needs to be solved first. Without the restoration of geopolitical subjectivity, our security problem cannot be solved. And I would speak in this connection not of national, but of civilizational security.
Further, it is necessary to raise the question of transferring the international security system from the state and national to civilization. To this end, for example, reforming the UN or developing inter-civilization cooperation structures, including, for example, the SCO.
Only by restoring our geopolitical subjectivity can we realize various projects in all areas of our security: from purely defense to informational and transformational, similar to the concept of "preventive strikes" and "soft power" of the United States.
In scientific, technological, cultural and civilizational terms, today we remain, perhaps, the only civilization that is in no way inferior to the Western civilization. Neither China, nor India, nor Japan, nor the Islamic world, nor Latin America possess such potential.
"TOMORROW". On the other hand, Russia almost completely lacks the “own / alien” coordinate system, which is very hard working for all other modern civilizations. Is this the disadvantage or dignity of our culture?
L.I. By and large, of course, dignity. But at short historical distances, the quality of “all-responsiveness,” which Dostoevsky pointed out, can lead, relatively speaking, to a “cardiac arrest” of our civilization. And here, as Alexander Andreyevich Prokhanov correctly notes, we can only rely on God, who allowed and allows us to actually "rise from the dead" every time. I really hope that the life force of our civilization, our superethnos, has more than one decade or even one hundred years, that Russia, Russian civilization will always be present in human history and on the map of our planet.