Jahanzaib Choudhry The world has undergone great geopolitical shifts in the past year. The unipolar order, constituted after the end of the Cold War under the leadership of the U.S. is definitively reaching its end. The US ruling elite very consciously realizes the danger of their grip on the world loosening. This elite is simultaneously faced with an international challenge from rising powers such as Russia and China who seek a multipolar world, as well as a profound domestic crisis emerging from a strong populist movement among impoverished American working people who seek an end to neoliberalism and endless wars. Trump and the American Ruling Elite To understand the thinking of the American ruling elite, it is first necessary to evaluate the presidency of Donald Trump which ended two years ago. The intense propaganda against Trump has made an objective evaluation of his presidency almost impossible. Yet, to see the movement objectively and move away from a subjective evaluation of Trump’s personality is to realize it was a populist, if contradictory, movement against the policies of neoliberalism and endless wars. The movement was a result of the terrible conditions of the American people produced by decades of war and globalization. U.S. life expectancy has “fallen off a cliff”. Decades of de-industrialization have created poverty, inequality and jobs that people don’t want. A major aspect of Trump’s platform was to move towards peaceful co-existence with Russia and North Korea. Even those who criticized Trump viciously like Noam Chomsky have admitted that he was the only major U.S. statesman making a sensible proposal on diplomatic negotiations with Russia. Thus the anti-Trump movement saw a range of disparate forces including Wall Street Bankers, NGO Activists, the mainstream media and the intelligence agencies unite with the singular goal of ending the Trump presidency. The Black Lives Matter protests in 2020 have completely disappeared over the past two years, pointing to the fact that these protests were in fact anti-Trump protests and had little to do with black lives. Similarly Trump’s own administration, and generals opposed his agenda from within. Trump’s account was blocked by Twitter during the elections and other social media companies like Facebook openly worked against him. While the American media has painted these figures as heroes, the fact remains that these were unelected unaccountable and extremely powerful individuals blocking the actions of a democratically elected leader. The candidate chosen to oppose Trump was Joe Biden, who as Vice President in the Obama administration had personally spearheaded a regime change operation against the independent government of Ukraine in 2014. The media participated in an intense anti-Russia campaign including peddling fake conspiracy theories about Russia’s involvement in the 2016 election and suppressed news of his son Hunter Biden’s use of his father’s office for illicit international business deals. American “progressives” openly talked about a color revolution to topple Trump. Furthemore, serious allegations of voter-fraud emerged. All of this created the conditions where more than 40% of voters doubt that American elections were free and fair in the world’s foremost democracy! These domestic conditions set the context for the war in Ukraine that was to emerge during the Biden presidency. War in Ukraine Even relatively mainstream U.S. commentators have pointed out that the war in Ukraine can only be blamed on the U.S. and its NATO allies. The western elite believed the Russian economy had become too self-sufficient and the Russian state too independent under the presidency of Vladimir Putin. Rebuffed by attempts to be treated as an equal by the West, including a failed bid for Russia itself to join NATO, Putin moved to renationalise key resources such as its massive oil and gas reserves, pay off Russia’s foreign debt, and build strong ties with China and other nations of the Third World. After the disastrous US regime changes in Iraq and Libya, Russia became a key proponent of international law and national sovereignty including sending military support at the request of President Bashar Al Assad to oppose the West’s regime change project against the Syrian government. Washington increasingly saw Putin’s Russia as an obstacle to unipolar dominance of the world. Biden’s foreign policy priority became to induct Ukraine as a member state of NATO, including placing nuclear weapons on its territory crossing a public redline for Moscow and adding the final nail in the coffin of the promise made by the US to Mikahil Gorbachev that no former Eastern Bloc nation would be inducted into NATO. It must be remembered that after the 2014 coup, the Ukrainian government took an extreme anti-Russian turn and banned the Russian language, unleashed Neo Nazi militia to attack Russian speaking citizens of Ukraine, and shelled the Russian speaking areas of its own territory leading to the deaths of over 14,000 people over the following years committing war crimes in the process. Further, even though Russians pushed for a diplomatic solution to resolve their dispute with the coup government via the Minsk Accords, the Ukrainian government refused to implement these accords. The Biden administration was fully cognizant of the result of its actions and deliberately continued to push Russia to a point where it took military action. Hence a media campaign was stirred up saying the Russians would “invade” Ukraine, ignoring the myriad ways US policy had produced the situation in which Russia would be left with no other choice. The media campaign also ignores the blatant hypocrisy of the US’s destructive invasions during the so called Global War on Terror, ongoing military occupation of places like Iraq, and more than 900 military bases worldwide including several in Russia’s bordering nations. Yet, seemingly the whole of the West united in condemning Russia's lone military action at its own border and in self-defense. Effects on the Third World In total contrast to the Western hyperbole on painting Russia as the world’s most criminal nation, the third world has been very quiet and refused to accept this narrative. A UN General Assembly resolution was moved by the United States to condemn Russia’s military operation. While much was made of the number of governments that supported the resolution, the fact is that many major states in Asia and Africa abstained from the resolution. All major countries of South Asia including India and Pakistan, many major countries in Africa including South Africa, Algeria, Angola and Senegal as well as East and South East Asian countries like China and Vietnam abstained. These same nations also refused to cut off economic ties with Russia, especially its crucial energy industry in the face of massive sanctions on Russia by the US. The process that started after the cold war of Russia looking towards the west has now reversed. Russia is now looking away from the west and looking towards Asia. Russia and China have started a strategy of cooperation without limits. Russia’s ties with Iran have also greatly strengthened, a fact that the U.S. State Department considers a “grave threat”. At the same time, Russia is trying to expand its market for selling energy beyond Europe. It has offered discounts and trade in native currencies to countries as a way to incentivize transactions in the Third World. India has been a major partner who has taken up this offer for discounted energy. Recently the BRICS International Forum president announced that India-Russia trade will exclude the dollar entirely. The Indian government’s refusal to comply with US sanctions has been met with open criticism and threats of retaliation from the US State Department. Pakistan’s former prime minister Imran Khan openly alleges that his removal via a vote of no confidence was orchestrated by the US State Department to prevent signing of agreements with Russia and to downgrade Pakistan’s relations with China. In effect, a new axis is emerging around Russia, China and Iran away from the dominance of the west. The role of South Asia, especially India, will be crucial in the global geopolitical shift, as will be the role of Africa. Finally, it is important to consider that the world is considering going to a post-dollar world. The U.S. dollar is an effective planck of western dominance which it weaponizes through sanctions. Russian and Western Economies The unilateral sanctions imposed by the West were expected to cripple the Russian economy and bring it to its knees. To the contrary, they have revealed the strength of the Russian economy due to its energy reserves and strong industrial sector. Western sanctions have had a limited impact on Russian oil production. Since the Russian special military operation began in February and was met by US sanctions, the ruble has reached a 7 year high. The Economist recently admitted that sanctions against Russia were not working. Putin’s domestic popularity has increased and is at a high 80%. In stark contrast, the US has seen perhaps the greatest fall in living standards in a single year in living memory. Inflation is at a record high as are prices for many essential items including fuel and food. Supply chain issues are leading to shortages. Massive amounts of money were printed since the pandemic, first to support corporations during Covid lockdowns then to fund the Ukrainian government’s war efforts. Biden continues to heavily weaponize and fund Ukraine. Biden’s approval rating is at 33% a record low for a president only in his second year in office. Recent polls show a majority of even his own party’s voters do not want him to run for reelection. The situation in Western Europe is even worse. German inflation has hit a 50 year high. Though Western Europe is heavily dependent on Russian oil and gas, it is under immense pressure to reduce its intake due to US sanctions. Major European economies are facing severe economic contradictions due to following US sanctions. With Russia indefinitely suspending the Nordstream pipeline, the coming winter will see massive price rises for heating, likely leading to major unrest among the European populace. All of this points to a western ruling elite in crisis that is confronting intense discontent at home and an emerging multipolar world order globally. Furthermore, they are facing an economic crisis which may be even worse than the 2008 recession. Vladimir Putin in his speeches has started becoming more and more explicit. In recent speeches in St. Petersburg in June and Moscow in August Putin has castigated the US for think it was “God’s messenger on Earth” after the end of the Cold War and criticized the “neocolonial” mentality of “globalist elites” for not respecting the sovereign rights of various nation’s choosing their own paths to development. A bloc of non-Western powers led by Russia, China, Iran, Venezuela, Syria among others is pushing for a changed world order that reflects the interests of the majority of mankind, not a select global elite. The west is painting this struggle as the struggle between “democracy” and “authoritarianism”. These states, however, are asserting the democratic right of a people to choose their own destiny. It will be very important for all third world nations to pay particular attention to these global processes and not be misled by western propaganda. The objective conditions in the world have created the possibility of fulfilling the vision of the processes emerging from the anti-colonial struggle and the Non-Aligned Movement. It will require ideological clarity to be able to move the peoples of the world in the direction of such a vision. Jahanzaib Choudhry is a graduate student at Carnegie Melon University and a member of the Saturday Free School.
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January 2025
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