Posted on 12/04/2005 10:10:26 AM PST by Gengis Khan
WASHINGTON, DC, United States (UPI) -- The Bush administration is quietly seeking to build with Britain, Japan and India a globe-spanning coalition system that can contain China, claims a leading neo-conservative thinker.
'Over the past six months, the Bush administration has upgraded its budding strategic partnerships with India and Japan. Along with the steady special relationship with Great Britain, what is beginning to emerge is a global coalition system -- it is too soon to call it a true alliance -- for the post-Cold War world,' argues Thomas Donnelly, resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute.
In a new essay just published by the AEI, titled 'The Big Four Alliance: The New Bush Strategy,' Donnelly says that 'far from maintaining a unilateralist approach to American security,' the Bush administration has been forging a strategic partnership structure that can help to manage the rise of China, while also buttressing the liberal international order of free trade, free markets and expanded democracy.
'You might call this emerging set of alliances the 4x4 strategy,' Donnelly suggests. 'It is built around four great powers -- the United States, Great Britain, Japan, and India -- who share four basic strategic principles: that the dangers of radicalism, failing despotic governments, and nuclear proliferation in the greater Middle East are too great to ignore; that the growing military strength and political ambitions of Beijing`s autocrats make it far from certain that China`s `rise` will be a peaceful one; that the spread of representative forms of government will increase the prospects for a durable peace; and that military force remains a useful and legitimate tool of national statecraft.'
What is striking and new is that Donnelly, a powerful advocate of a strong U.S. defense, now acknowledges that the American role is overstretched and can no longer sustain its lonely superpower role.
'We need help,' he suggests.
'It is clear that the Defense Department`s initial conception of `transformation` -- substituting capital for labor, firepower for manpower -- has not removed the inherent constraints imposed by a small force, reduced by 40 percent from its final Cold-War strength. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld`s preference for temporary `coalitions of the willing` has been supplanted by a new understanding that preserving the Pax Americana requires more permanent arrangements. This is not to suggest that the emerging Big Four allies are not willing partners, but simply to grasp that the immensity and difficulty of the military and broader security tasks have stretched current U.S. armed forces to a degree that they cannot sustain. We need help.'
Donnelly, formerly with the Lockheed Corporation and also former policy director at the House Committee on National Security, was one of the leading figures in the Project for the New American Century, the group from which the highly influential neo-conservatives emerged to dominate the thinking of the Bush administration after the terrorist attacks of 9/11. A highly controversial figure to many Democrats and to opponents of the Iraq War, Donnelly also played an important role in Congressional relations with the Pentagon, particularly over the 1997 and 2001 Quadrennial Defense Reviews.
'The central pillar of the new alliance is, of course, the United States,' Donnelly writes. 'Just as the Truman Doctrine committed the United States to lead the Cold War allies, so has the Bush Doctrine cast the country as primus inter pares among today`s allies; Britain, India, and Japan are becoming partners in a Pax Americana that is generally accepted across the political spectrum.
'No other power can perform this essential organizing and leadership role,' Donnelly writes. 'The Clinton administration took the primacy of the United States as much for granted as has the Bush administration. There is no reason to think that the next Democratic administration will change this fundamental approach.'
Donnelly leans heavily on the British alliance, which he calls 'our most constant source of strategic and military help' and praises their 'superbly professional forces, on a par with U.S. forces and possessed of particular strengths in special operations and expeditionary warfare.
'The Anglo-American military alliance remains the gold standard against which all others are measured and to which others -- particularly the Japanese alliance -- aspire,' he argues. In Tokyo, 'politicians across the spectrum now accept the premise that Japan should act like a `normal` nation and should assume some role in `collective self-defense` -- a euphemism for an alliance with the United States.
'Greater still is the gap between India`s potential as an alliance partner and the current reality,' Donnelly notes. 'Nevertheless, it may be that, over the course of time, the strategic relationship between Washington and New Delhi can become the keystone to preservation of the Pax Americana. The CIA has concluded that India is the most important `swing state` in the international system.'
India has a long way to go, Donnelly concedes, both in modernizing its largely Soviet-made weaponry and in learning inter-operability with U.S. forces
'Translating diplomatic desire into hard-core military power and interoperability between Indian and U.S. forces will take many years,' he writes. 'Military-to-military contacts with U.S. forces are increasing, but neither Indian nor Japanese forces yet enjoy the kind of close professional relationship that has existed for many years between U.S. and British armed services.
'In truth, the whole concept of a `Big Four` global partnership is more potential than real,' Donnelly concedes. 'There is not much chance of any Big Four summits or alliance charters on the horizon. Indeed, such a summit would be counterproductive; even if successful, this would be an alliance that dares not speak its name. The open question is whether common interests and common values can make this coalition a more permanent basis for American strategy.'
If I remember correctly, Monroe doctrine is bashed as unashamedly US imperialist in places like Cambridge University history courses on US history.
And some of the classic final year research dissertation titles for Cambridge students reading (i.e. studying) US History are
1) Political Identities of American Exiles to New Brunswick, c. 1782-c.1812
2) Crime and the Entertainment Industry in Chicago, 1921-1933
3) Nixon, the Christmas Bombing and the Paris Peace Accords, 1972-73
4) The Experience of Japanese Americans during the Civil Rights Movement
5) The Suburban Critique and the American New Towns Movement
6) Theodore Roosevelt and American imperialism.
Needless to say, in much of history works published in Britain, Teddy Roosevelt is uniformly vilified as an unapologetic promoter of imperialism and militarism (due to "Speak softly but carry a big stick"). In fact I was so surprised to see that the American liberals had anything good to say about Teddy Roosevelt when I read about the Time magazine's sketches of greatest 20th century people in their 1999/2000 editions.
Britain a great power????? They no longer have the will or the means to ba a world power.
I'm guessing continental EU would sit the one out - trying to play the "honest broker" and meanwhile dealing with accelerating social disintegration at home.
Latin America is another story. Venezuela and Brazil would be the focus of the Chinese counterweight in the hemisphere (hopefully Mexico won't join - even their left wingers appear suspicious of Chavez). But there's no power-projection capability among these countries, so I don't think the US has to worry too much.
Hello?
India is big strong and growing like gang busters.
They were pro-Soviet in the past but W and his great adminstration have changed the formula.
This 4-Power approach is right on target.
Interesting. I was a little troubled by the use of the phrase "Pax Americana" too but didn't think too much about it until your post put it into context.
Agreed that many (most?) Brits didn't like the Iraq War. But that didn't bite Blair enough to lose the most recent election, so he appears to have been forgiven for standing with us. I think that for as much as Brits dislike having to follow the lead of a former colony in foreign/military policy, their intrinsic dislike/distrust of the continental Euros is stronger. At least for the near future...
Thank you very much! Readers in New Zealand occasionally see British speech that is a little hidden from American readers (see long list of British publications not permitting posting of their articles here on FR).
One bit of evidence of Teddy Roosevelt's anti-imperialism is that Mexico has its own government--a government that often disagrees with our own. ;-) President Bush has been a most friendly president to Mexico, which Mexican government desires abolition of US immigration laws and an open border with no security.
Teddy Roosevelt was a fiscal (economic) conservative (anti-labor-union) but a social "progressive" (leftist), IMO. He was also a radical environmentalist in his time.
Mmmm. Just how wrecked is our economy at this point in time?
I worked a contract with a US telephone company that was bought out by a Brit. Crazy, anti-American Salvadoran and Panamanian chicks (his hiring policy) ran me out of the place.
Good point. Indians are shoe makers, accountants, friggin' patsies. As for the Japs, you give them a little encouragement, they'll pull out their anscestor's katanas, put bandanas on their heads, and start bayonetting babies and decapitating prisoners all over east asia! When the going gets tough, you gotta remember which of your friends are the more reliable.
???When did this happen? I believe India has crossed the billion mark, but China is like a billion.two, no?
The Seldon plan revealed already??!!
Yup, there's the second foundation of think tanks and policy wonks who's already decided the contors of the coming alliance. Personally, I dont see any problems with the hypotheses presented in the article. The EU and Russia with large islamic populations within their borders will turn into the enemy sometime within this century.
You are correct.
Currently India has 1 billion while China has 1.3 billion. But India's population rate is more than China and I read from somewhere that its population will be largest in the world by 2035.
<< Yeah I was rather surprised they were not included as well. They're definitely a partner - same free market and democratic credentials, same "superbly trained" professional military. >>
Amazing, isn't it, how folks who lean toward, kowtow to and/or carry post-colonial shoulder chips for the Brits and the rest of the Old Euro-peons, minimize and/or discount absolutely America's first and best-ever ally, Australia!
Israel, manning Judeo-Christian/Western/Human Civilization's furthest forward frontier forts, is of major importance, also. And as-tiny Singapore, surrounded within an as potentially-hostile environment as is the Nation of Israel, is not to be sneered at!
They were pro-Soviet in the past but W and his great adminstration have changed the formula.
I think the shift predated Bush. He has capitalized on the fact they were unlinked from the USSR (because the USSR was no more, and for the overall practicality of India joining the free west community of powers.
I have posted this on another thread :
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1533892/posts?page=31
And let me post it here again for your benefit:
"You over estimate Australia's importance as an ally against China and Islam.
I remember the Australian Cricket team was just too scared to even land in Sri Lanka during the cricket world cup due to terrorist threat, when in fact there was nothing really to fear.
Australia may be great allies but they are still limited by their size and power projection. On the Indian Ocean, South China Sea and the Pacific ocean they have none. In their own region they are swamped (and threatened) by a much larger and stronger Indonesia. Let alone India by far, Australia by itself (without American help) is nowhere near equalling Malayasia's economic and military might or the military might of Vietnam. Australia never ever fought a war on its own let alone having the capacity to win wars by itself. It rarely ever had to defend its own borders. It has no experiance whatsoever in fighting Islamic terrorism or Chinese Communism. India has fought both. India's knowledge, experiance, intelligence, military might and expertise against Islam and China may prove to be vital for the US. Australia may provide a strategic base and a launch pad for the US navy or airforce in the region but on its own it may hardly be in a posaition to provide anything beyond a token help.
And most importantly Australia is too far away and too much geostrategically disconnected from the Cental Asian politics to have a stake in it. It may have growing concern over the Chinese economic and military dominance in its own backyard i.e the South East Asian region, but Australia may prefer to conciliate with China which may be economically and politically more beneficial for both rather than directly go down the confrontationist path."
And you always make me laugh whenever you even so much as mention Singapore (the country where I was born). Its a ludicrous idea to even think of (a predominantly Chinese) Singapore as an ally against China.
What are you talking about? India may have a few advanced weapons systems, but on the whole, China is vastly stronger. I take it you're just talking out of your derriere.
As for Japan, Inc, we own them.
I'm sure the Japanese would be startled to hear that. Japan is once again making enemies in the region -- pushing other countries (like South Korea, and even Taiwan) closer into the fold of the PRC. The US is the only remaining regional power to whom Japan can turn to for support. So it does.
India was never pro-Soviet, just pro-Indian. At times (especially given Chinese and American support for Pakistan), India sought political, economic and military aid from the USSR, but that's a lot less a question of ideology than it is of realpolitik.
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