Coincidently, in one of my IR classes yesterday we were talking about the Berlin blockade and the onset of the previous, thankfully Cold war. So my students tried to use some system theories to explain the conflict and to draw parallels with the current situation. But, they were running into a problem. Taken over time, realism seemed to explain well the Cold war conflict, but was falling short to provide a satisfactory explanation for the behavior of the US since its end, while liberalism with its emphasis on cooperation, interdependence, etc. was failing to account for Russia's and Ukraine's behavior in the immediate runup to the Russian aggression.
Then, it dawned on me, that the two main great powers in this conflict -- US and Russia -- were seeing today the world through very different prisms. The US was taking the liberal order approach, while Russia was taking the old realist balance of power approach.
To explain it better to the students, I suggested the following. I asked them to imagine that they discovered that their neighbor held women and children as personal slaves. What would they do? They would call the police, was the answer. Why? Because it is immoral and against the principles of human rights to hold slaves. So far, so good.
Now, I asked them to imagine the same situation, but living somewhere far away in the mountain or in the desert, in some destitute place, where there has never been police or a state as such. That they grew up in this place, fending for themselves, making their own weapons, and preparing to defend against anyone and everyone, relying only on themselves: a true self-help system. What would they do then? The answer was, well not so sure, probably will let this guy be. So, most said that they will have to accept that the bully on the hill next to them is a monster and let him be with his slaves, but will prepare to defend themselves better in case he goes after them next. Some suggested that they will look around for others, with whom to form a community to defend themselves collectively.
So, their first concern was now their own survival and that of their loved ones, and not the wrong he was doing to his slaves.
Only one guy, however, offered what appears the solution to the problem of explaining consistently the behavior of both the US and Russia over the past 30 years. He said, I will train, and I will arm myself. And, if I find others, great, but if I don't I will make sure that I am strong and weaponized enough to take this guy, and I will begin my quest. Once again, I asked - why? Because what he is doing to these people, holding them as slaves is still wrong, the student answered. And, if there is no police, and there is no state to stop what is wrong, I will train, and I will look for others to join me, and I will do it myself.
So, there it was - the core of the liberal belief in life, property, and pursuit of happiness in practice as an explanation for the reasons why the US has been pushing for NATO enlargement to include Ukraine and Georgia, and for the color revolutions, greater democratization, etc. And, also the real reasons for Putin's fear that when the bear dances next door, sooner or later it will come to his backyard, as well. Putin saw the world from a realist perspective, the US saw it from a liberal one. The one hoped to use raw power to secure his interests, the other ready to go to a great extreme in the name of its core values. But, Putin saw his own destiny reflected in the color revolutions in Ukraine, Georgia, etc. And, he decided to hit first.
For a long time, it made no sense to me why the US pushed the boundaries with NATO in Ukraine, especially since 2008 on. From a realist foreign policy perspective, such an approach was clearly a mistake. It was unnecessarily poking Russia in the eye with a stick. As John Mearsheimer was saying in the now-viral video from 2015, would the US accept Canada or Mexico entering into a military alliance run by China? Never! So wouldn't Russia, Putin's or not. It is a violation of logic. Forget about sovereignty, this concept is relative. Sovereignty has never been absolute, only conditional. Great powers violate it all the time because they can. Smaller powers insist on its inviolability. So, the question I could not understand was why was the US pushing this enlargement, knowing that this will provoke a conflict with Russia?
The answer became clear yesterday in the noble determination of this student. Because in the West we care about values more than we care about pragmatism. From a liberal point of view, it makes total sense. When you see your values as universal, pertaining to all human beings no matter where they live, and when you have the means to disseminate them and enforce them, you try hard to spread them around as much as you can, regardless of the practical considerations, or the actual cost. We put ideas and ideals before the triviality of life. Because the life that is not lived to its fullest, is not worth living in the first place, right? Of course, this specific kind of reasoning often requires a particular comfort of life to justify such a point of view, I am afraid. But, that is a minor detail, a nuisance really.
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