Commentary No. 43, July 1, 2000
"The Upheavals of June, 2000"
The month of June 2000 may go down in history as a major turning-point of post-1945 history, and few commentators seem to have seized on the importance of the events. The events to which I refer are Putin's visit to Germany and the summit of the two Koreas. It is not that they were not noticed, but the commentators tended to analyze them in Cold War terms, whereas their importance precisely is that they made Cold War terminology irrelevant.
It all starts with the fact that the U.S. has badly overplayed its hand, by reopening the question of a missile defense shield (see Comment No. 39, "The United States as Nuclear Champion"). The roots of this militarily very unnecessary move by the U.S. derives in small part from the usual desire of military leaders for the newest toys and in larger part to the vagaries of U.S. internal politics. The Republicans are desperate to win the presidency and decided that an old card that usually worked for them, more money for the military, would win them votes. And Clinton, true to his up to now very successful tactic of combating the Republicans by proposing the same thing they do, in somewhat watered-down terms, started the ball rolling. What the U.S. did not count on was how
strong and how immediate the reaction of other countries would be.
The Republicans expected Russia opposition and didn't care. Clinton thought he could assuage Putin. The U.S. (both factions) presented their proposals as dealing with the threat of "rogue states". They had North Korea particularly in mind. But they failed to think the proposal out. If the U.S. builds a missile defense shield, then other nuclear powers must either upgrade their own nuclear arsenal (which is costly) or find that whatever strength they now derived from their nuclear arsenal would become irrelevant. In short, the first losers would be not only Russia and China, but Great Britain, France, and by extension Germany (as part of a European defense force).
So the first thing that has come to pass was what the U.S. has had as a nightmare for 50 years, a coming together of Russia and Germany. The German Chancellor, Gerhard Schröder, was deeply upset by Clinton's proposal. He considered it costly and dangerous, and said so. When Putin came to Berlin to agree and to offer cooperation on a European common missile defense, Schröder was ready to listen. Even so pro-American a German as Josef Joffe, editor of the influential Der Zeit, said that "a clumsy U.S. Goliath invites an alliance of Davids." And the British external affairs commissioner of the European Union said that Europe had to grow into a "serious counterpart" of the U.S.
Europe was born in June 2000. Of course, we have been talking about Europe for 50-odd years now. But heretofore Europe has meant western Europe, not Europe from the Atlantic to the Urals, dear to both Charles de Gaulle and Mikhail Gorbachev. Hitherto, the Germans would not really hear of it because of their post-1945 fidelity to the United States. Now it has been launched. A small step, but in the old Chinese adage, a journey of a thousand years starts with such small steps.
What most commentators missed was a story in Le Monde on June 2, in which the French reporter, with access to German sources, revealed a quiet agreement between the French and the Germans. Up to now, the extension and expansion of "Europe" has been held up by the unanimity rule and by the equal vote for the big powers. The French had been the most insistent on retaining both. Now they agreed to the German desire to give Germany the extra votes its population size justifies and to work out a "qualified majority" system. This crucial step makes it possible to move forward not merely with east-central Europe but more importantly with Russia.
Meanwhile, at the other end of the world, the dramatic summit between the presidents of the two Koreas occurred. No one quite expected this to occur even six months ago. Many thought it would never occur. Why did it occur now? On the one hand, Kim Jong-Il, the President of North Korea, which has been the ostensible primary target of the new U.S. plans, has decided to counter them by an astute mixture of threats and diplomatic overtures to China, to Japan, to Russia, and now to South Korea). President Kim Dae-jung
of South Korea has been pushing for such a summit since he was inaugurated. Partly, he was serving the interests of South Korean businessmen, partly he wanted to be sure South Korea was not cut out of any U.S.-North Korean arrangement, and partly (maybe mostly) he thought this was the road to peace and eventual reunification.
The U.S. was never happy about Kim Dae-jung's initiatives, but found them difficult to oppose. They simply didn't expect them to work. It seems likely that Clinton's announcement of a nuclear defense shield hastened interest in both Koreas in holding this summit. The North Koreans were anxious to vitiate the case for the U.S. missile defense shield. And the South Koreans were thinking a bit like the west Europeans, since they too are a "quasi-nuclear power."
But consider the consequences. The first steps towards reunification have been taken. It will be a slow, difficult, winding process, but somewhere down the line it will occur - on what terms, one cannot be sure. One immediate consequence of the Korean summit has been to bring Taiwan and China one little step closer, as though they didn't want Korea to get a step ahead of them. Now if Korea unites and China unites, will the U.S. be able to continue the role it has been playing in East Asia? Very doubtful. Rather, we might see a China-Korea-Japan "alliance of Davids."
This is not for tomorrow. But the U.S. has definitely overplayed its hand, and brought world geopolitical realignment into
Immanuel Wallerstein
[Copyright by Immanuel Wallerstein. All rights reserved. Permission is granted to download, forward electronically or e-mail to others and to post this text on non-commercial community Internet sites, provided the essay remains intact and the copyright note is displayed. To translate this text, publish it in printed and/or other forms, including commercial Internet sites and excerpts, contact the author at iwaller@binghamton.edu; fax: 1-607-777-4315.
These commentaries, published twice monthly, are intended to be reflections on the contemporary world scene, as seen
from the perspective not of the immediate headlines but of the long term.]
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