Major foreign policy challenges for the next US President

ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI * This article appears as a new president assumes office in the United States. He does so in the middle of a widespread crisis of condence in Americas capacity to exercise effective leadership in world affairs. That may be a stark thought, but it is a fact. Though American leadership over the decades that have passed since the United States replaced Great Britain as the Great Power of the world has been essential to global stability and to global development, the cumulative effects of national self-indulgence, of nancial greed and irresponsibility, of an unnecessary war of the countrys own choice, falsely justied, and of ethical transgressions have discredited that leadership. Making matters worse is the global economic crisis. The resulting international challenge that now confronts the new US President is compounded in its complexity by the fact that it is occurring in the context of two simultaneous, and interacting, transformational developments on the world political scene. The rst concerns the emergence of global issues pertaining to human wellbeing as critical worldwide political concernsissues such as climate, environment, starvation, health and social inequality. These issues are becoming more contentious because they have come to the fore in the context of what I have described in my writings as the global political awakening, itself a truly transformative event on the global scene. For the rst time in human history almost all of humanity is politically activated, politically conscious and politically interactive. There are only a few pockets of humanity left in the remotest corners of the world that are not politically alert and engaged with the political turmoil and stirrings that are so widespread today around the world. The resulting global political activism is generating a surge in the quest for personal dignity, cultural respect and economic opportunity in a world painfully scarred by memories of centuries-long alien colonial or imperial domination. The second pertains to yet another fundamental change: a shift in the distribution of global power from the West to the East. The 500-year-long domination of the world by the Atlantic powersPortugal, Spain, France, the Netherlands, Britain and, more recently, the United Statesis coming to an end with the new
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This article is an edited version of the John C. Whitehead lecture delivered at Chatham House, London, on 17 November 2008.

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Zbigniew Brzezinski political and global pre-eminence of both China and Japan (the latter already the number two economic power in the world). Waiting in the wings are India and perhaps a recovered Russia, though the latter is still restless and unsure of its identity, ambivalent about its recent past and very insecure about its place in the world. But these major world powers, new and old, also face a novel reality: while the lethality of their military might is greater than ever, their capacity to impose control over the politically awakened masses of the world is at a historic low. To put it bluntly: in earlier times, it was easier to control one million people than to physically kill one million people; today, it is innitely easier to kill one million people than to control one million people. That insight bears directly on the use of force, particularly by societies that are culturally alien even if technologically superior. As a result, in the current post-colonial era, it is too costly to undertake colonial wars. That is a reality some recent American policy-makers failed to assimilate, to Americas detriment. In this dynamically changing world context, the crisis of American leadership could in fact become the crisis of global stability. Yetdespite the Schadenfreude at Americas nancial travails evident in some capitals during the early stages of the current crisisin the foreseeable future no state or combination of states can replace the linchpin role America plays in the international system. The fact of the matter is that without an American recovery there will be no global recovery. But there could be an American recovery without the recovery of some major economies. That reality underlies the proposition that at this stage of history there is no international alternative to a central American role. In fact, the only real alternative to a constructive American world role is global chaos. It follows from the foregoing that the monumental task in foreign affairs for the newly elected President of the United States (beyond coping with the immediate nancial crisis) is to regain global legitimacy for America by spearheading a collective effort for a more inclusive system of global management. Four little but strategically pregnant words dene the essence of the response required: to unify; to enlarge; to engage; and to pacify. To unify means to re-establish a shared sense of purpose between America and Europe (more specically, between the United States and the EU), as well as in NATO, pointing towards more truly shared decision-making. To that end, informal but frequent top-level consultations are badly needed, especially after the last eight years of sloganeering under the banner If you are not with us, you are against us. However, it is much easier to dene this as a desirable goal than to accomplish it. Americans and Europeans alike are very well aware that there is no such thing yet as a politically unied Europe. The absence of a politically unied Europe creates real complications for any process of revitalizing, re-establishing, and making central a renewed transatlantic dialogue. What, then, is a viable alternative? To rely on the institutional arrangements implicit in the Treaty of Lisbon might be the formal response, but that would simply ignore the political realities of intra-European divisions regarding key 54
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Major foreign policy challenges for the next US President strategic issues as well as the great disparities of power among the various sovereign components of the EU. Therefore, the only practical solution in the near future is to cultivate a more deliberate dialogue between the United States and the three European countries that have a global orientation and, in varying degrees, global interests: the United Kingdom, France and Germany. But a US dialogue with the European Triad can in turn only be effective and meaningful if those three countries establish a broad and fundamental consensus among themselves. One of the key problems of the past eight years, irrespective of the shortcomings of US foreign policy, has been that there was no European partner for the United States to consider seriously, no partner who could give Washington its honest advice, no partner with whom America could share common decisions and burdens. The United States had a very close, personal and loyal ally in the United Kingdom, a country with which America shares genuine kinship. But if one were to assign historical responsibility for Americas war of choice in Iraq, the unfortunate fact is that such responsibility has to be shared with the UK, whose prime minister publicly defended the war vigorously, and privately advocated it persuasivelyeven if occasionally whispering some reservations and making alternative suggestions which the US President could safely ignore while pocketing the much needed public endorsement. France and Germany, for their part, engaged essentially in competitive public denunciations of US policy (which, even if merited, are still painful to Americans), and that was not helpful to the emergence of a serious transatlantic dialogue. As a result, there was no conversation of any note between President Bush and Chancellor Schroeder and equally little between President Bush and President Chirac (who in the process offended parts of Europe by asking them to shut up when they were inclined to support the United States). As a practical matter, there is no alternative to an informal arrangement between the United States and the three leading European powersonce they have come to share a common strategic purpose. If that should materialize, America would listen. And together, America and the EU, which between them account for more than half of global GDP, could muster a weighty capacity for inuencing the world in a positive and responsible direction. If this new unity is to be meaningful, both sides have to be willing to share both in decisions and in the resulting burdens. For too many years now, the general pattern has been that the United States makes the decisions and expects the Europeans to share the burdens. For too many years, the Europeans have complained they are excluded from decision-making but have been perfectly willing to let the Americans assume the burdens of implementation. The current differences among the allies over Afghanistan are but the latest example of that persisting dilemma. It is, therefore, to be hoped that the new US administration will make a deliberate effort to revitalize the AmericanEuropean dialogue at the highest level. This task could be assigned personally to the Vice-President, who has impressive expertise in foreign affairs, knows the continent well, and is personally known in its political circles. The task cannot be a full-time job for the President himself, 55
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Zbigniew Brzezinski though his unique global standing should help in the pursuit of this transatlantic goal. Similarly, the new Secretary of State can play a constructive role, though obviously she will be occupied with many other issues. To enlarge entails a deliberate effort to nurture a wider coalition of principal partners who are committed to the principle of interdependence and prepared to play a signicant political, as well as economic, role in promoting more effective global management. The partners have to be genuine practitioners of inter dependence and be ready to participate in the necessary consultations, in the required institutionalization of the process, and in the assumption of some jointly determined burdens. It is evident by now that the G7, subsequently enlarged to G8, has outlived its function. The G7 started as an informal council of the advanced industrial democratic societies. Russia, an industrial society, was admitted at a time when its democratic credentials were debatable but at least to some extent evident. Today, these democratic credentials are discredited. In any case, neither the original G7 or the later G8 reects existing global realities. Accordingly, some formula for regular consultations ranging in composition from G14 to G16 should be devised to bring together countries that possess not only economic and nancial weight but also regional geopolitical signicance. To be sure, such an arrangement would somewhat duplicate the existing formal mechanisms of the UN, which have attained an almost eternal lifespan because they require international unanimity to change them. Those who benet the most from the 1945 arrangements are clearly not prepared to reform the UN in order to reect the current realities of global power. A politically minded grouping of states with clout consulting regularly outside the UN is therefore essential. To engage means the cultivation, in addition to a wider circle of partners, of regular top-level but informal dialogues among the several powers of the world that are crucial to global geopolitical stability: specically, the United States, the European Triad, China, Japan, Russia and possibly India. A regular and mutually condence-building personal dialogue between the top US leader and the top Chinese leader would be especially benecial to the development of a shared sense of global responsibility between the only current global superpower and the most likely next global power. China is the most important rising power in the world, and without China many of the key problems we face collectively cannot be effectively tackled. Admittedly, China is economically nationalist, and that is a problem, but it is also a fundamentally cautious and a patient revisionist power. It wishes to change the international system as China rises peacefully, but it is cautious in the way it is pursuing that objective. Indeed, among the hallmarks of Chinese leadership are foresight, prudence and patience. I have dealt with Chinese leaders for 30 years now, and I have come to respect their sense of balance and proportion. To me, what Deng Xiaoping said in the early 1990s articulated best how China denes its international approach: Observe calmly; secure our position; cope with affairs 56
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Major foreign policy challenges for the next US President calmly; hide our capacities and bide our time; be good at maintaining a low prole; and never claim leadership. These words also underline the signicant distinction between Chinas and Russias conduct on the international scene. Russia, like China, is a revisionist power in that it wishes to revise the existing international patterns; but in pursuit of this end it tends towards impatience, frustration and sometimes even posturing in a threatening fashion. Nonetheless, it is in the interest of the United States and of Europe to engage Russia, with regard to the larger strategic issues as well as more specically European geopolitical dilemmas. In so doing, America should concentrate on the strategic issues and seek new arrangements and agreements with Russia that would enhance global stability, promote reductions in nuclear weapons and also deal with such regional problems as Iran. At this stage, however, Russia is more a regional power than a global power. Hence, Europe has a special responsibility to try to engage Russia in a fashion that draws it into a closer association with Europe but without bringing its imperial baggage. Unfortunately, the current generation of Russian leaders, notably Putin, are still unable to come to terms with Russias diminished global status and its regional realities. It is unreconciled to the loss of its empire. It is unwilling to come to terms with its totalitarian and specically its Stalinist experience. The Foreign Minister of Russia recently declared that to equate Nazism and Stalinism is a blasphemy. Yet there are millions of people in Europe who recall that the two were profoundly similar and equally inhuman to their victims. The difficult process of self- recognition will take time until a new Russian elite emerges. Nonetheless, the current nancial crisis may create conditions for a gradual improvement in relations with Russia. That nancial crisis has made the Russian elite aware of a circumstance unprecedented in Russian history: Russia today is in fact interdependent with the rest of the world. The top political leaders of Russia until recently seemed to be oblivious to that reality, and they premised Russias future development on the notion of a continued spiral in the price of oil and on the erroneous assumption of Russias economic invulnerability vis--vis the rest of the world. In the context of Russias painfully learned awareness of its interdependence with the global economy, it may be more feasible to deal with such difficult issues as those posed by Ukraine and Georgia. Both for strategic and for historical reasons, neither the United States nor the EU can be indifferent to what transpires in the relations between Russia and these two countries. Last but not least, neither the United States nor the EU can lose sight of the fact that if the Georgian government were to be overthrown (and both Putin and his foreign minister, Lavrov, have spoken openly of that being their desire), the strategically vital access of the West to Azerbaijan, to the Caspian and to Central Asia would be cut, to the detriment of our collective interests. But if Russia is able to suborn either or both of these regimes, its imperial nostalgia will be stimulated, and Russia will become a more difficult geopolitical problem. 57
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Zbigniew Brzezinski It follows, therefore, that the April 2009 NATO summit should provide an opportunity for some collective steps designed to enhance a sense of security and stability in Ukraine and Georgia, though not in a manner that could exacerbate tensions with Russia. Both America and Europe will have to nd a way of reaffirming their commitment to the territorial integrity and democratic viability of these two states, while conveying to Russia that the western interest in them is related to the gradual construction of a larger democratic Europe and not designed to threaten Russia itself. Ultimately, Russia can be a more engaged participant in the Euro-Atlantic community only if its immediate neighbours to the west and south do not feel threatened by its lingering imperial aspirations. If Ukraine and Georgia are gradually assimilated into the Euro-Atlantic structures, Russia will have no alternative but to follow suit. The reality of interdependence is not only economic or nancial; it is now also geopolitical. To pacify requires a deliberate American effort to avoid becoming bogged down militarily and politically in the vast area ranging from east of Suez to west of India. An America bogged down in this area will be an America engaged in a protracted post-imperial war in the post-colonial age, a war not easy to win against aroused populations. The United States could even nd itself confronted simultaneously with an escalating IsraeliPalestinian conict (if the peace process falters), continued instability in Iraq impeding military disengagement and (possibly) the eruption of a conict with Iran, as well as a deepening and widening war in Afghanistan and Pakistan. It follows, therefore, that urgent decisions need to be made by the United States, with the help of Europe, regarding these critical and potentially interactive issues. The IsraeliPalestinian peace process needs to be addressed as a priority. It is evident by now that the parties in the conict will never reach a solution by themselves. Therefore, they have to be helped. America, with Europes help, can do so by dening explicitly the fundamental requirements of a genuine peace of reconciliation. The US President, even before sending a new envoy to the region, should state on the record that a peaceful accommodation between the two parties has to involve, rst, a demilitarized Palestinian state, perhaps with a NATO presence on its soil to enhance Israels sense of security; second, a territorial settlement based on the 1967 lines with equitable exchanges permitting Israel to incorporate the more heavily urbanized settlements on the fringes of those lines; third, acceptance by both parties of the fact that Palestinian refugees cannot return to what is now Israel, though they should be provided with some compensation and assistance for settling preferably in the independent Palestinian state; and last but not least, acceptance by Israelis that a durable peace of reconciliation will require the genuine sharing of Jerusalem as the capital of two states, with some kind of joint arrangement for the old city and a Palestinian ag over the golden dome. The war in Iraq is clearly waning, unless it is reignited by conicts in the adjoining regions. To bring it to a nal close, not only will American troops have to be withdrawn, but the United States will have to engage in serious discussions with Iraqi leaders regarding a rm date for US disengagement, as well as a serious 58
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Major foreign policy challenges for the next US President dialogue with all of Iraqs neighbours regarding regional stability. Iraqs neighbours have a collective interest in preventing any ensuing conicts in Iraq from spilling into their countries. They will be more prepared, however, to discuss this issue directly with the United States once it becomes clear that the United States is rm about military disengagement. The United States will also have to undertake a serious process of negotiations with Iran. The threat of military action is not a constructive option because it creates the impression that negotiations are being conducted under duress. Brandishing the threat plays into the hands of Iranian extremists. A war would be a disaster unpredictable in its scope and consequences. But, to be successful, the negotiations have to be genuinely reciprocal. That means abandoning the current US posture that the Iranians a priori have to make a one-sided concession as a precondition to negotiations. Finally, the strategy guiding Americas response to the increasingly linked security problems involving Afghanistan and Pakistan needs to be fundamentally reassessed. The United States and its allies should strive to avoid the mistakes that the Soviet Union committed in Afghanistan. While some additional troops may be necessary, the emphasis should be shifted from a military engagement to a more subtle effort to seek a decentralized political accommodation with those portions of the Taleban who are prepared to negotiate in a constructive fashion. In areas controlled by the Taleban, a mutual accommodation should involve the willingness of the Taleban to eliminate or to terminate any Al-Qaeda presence in return for western military disengagement from the pertinent territory. The process should also be accompanied by intensied AmericanEuropean efforts to help with the reconstruction of Afghanistans society and economy, both devastated by the extraordinarily brutal war that the Russians conducted for a decade. Such reconstruction should not be confused with nation-building, which in the case of Afghanistan is unlikely to be achieved if the western presence becomes increasingly viewed by the Afghans as a hostile military intrusion. Let me conclude on a parochial American note. America will have an intelligent foreign policy when we have an intelligent American president, and in this regard there is reason to be optimistic because we have just chosen one. But that is not enough. America is a democracy, and for American foreign policy to be effective, it needs the support of an intelligent and well-informed public. Unfortunately, the American public is woefully undereducated about the wider world. It knows little about it and understands it even less, whether in the form of global geography or the history of other peoples. In the complex new age, it is impossible for the American democracy to conduct an intelligently complex policy if the public is not educated about the world. Even worse, in recent times the American public became infected by a demagogically propagated culture of fear which then contributed to Americas self-isolation in the world. It follows that the new President will have to respond to the fact that the American public needs systematic education about the world. He will have to strive to make the American public understand the novel dimensions of global 59
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Zbigniew Brzezinski realities. That is an essential task that only he can undertake effectively. Without sounding overly partisan, and I am certainly not seeking to atter him, I believe that the newly elected US President has unique intellectual and rhetorical gifts for rising to the occasion and doing just that. So let me end my remarks by asserting simply, Yes, we can.

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