brzezinski | the consequensces of the end of the cold war for international security

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The consequences of the end of the cold war for

international securityDr Zbigniew Brzezinski

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aCenter for Strategic and International Studies, Washington, DC

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To cite this article: Dr Zbigniew Brzezinski (1991): The consequences of the end of the cold war for international security,The Adelphi Papers, 32:265, 3-17

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The Consequences of theEnd of the Cold War forInternational Security

DR ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI

The point of departure for a consideration of the consequences of theend of the Cold W ar must be a brief recapitulation of the repercussionsof the Cold War itself for international security.

Its principal consequences can be briefly summarized as havinginvolved three elements:

- first, the unprecedented polarization of world politics around twoideologically and geopolitically hostile superpowers - each sup-ported by a cluster of dependent allies or reluctant satellites,respectively - and with both sides seeking geostrategic preponder-ance in Eurasia;

- second, the tendency for regional military conflicts to escalate intosuperpower political contests, thus inflating the stakes involved insuch regional conflicts, while paradoxically containing their explos-ive potential;

- third, the pervasive danger - and public fear - th at superpower con-tests might someday get out of control, precipitating a globalnuclear disaster. The Cold Wa r was thus viewed as the potential pre-cursor, indeed, as the potential catalyst, of a 'hot war'.

The end of the Cold War has obviously altered that situation. How -ever, it is not only the end of the war itself, bu t also the way in whichit ended that is germane to any serious assessment of the impa ct of thecessation of hostilities on internation al security.

The Cold War ended in a lukewarm peace, in contrast to the 'coldpeace ' that usually follows a h ot war. There w as no act of capitulation,as in Compiegne in 1918 or in Rheim s in 1945. Precisely because theCold War did end peacefully, both the victors and the vanquishedshared an interest in obscuring the fact that it did, in fact, end in a vic-

tory. Nonetheless, the Pa ris conference of Nov emb er 1990, a scene ofEas t-W est rec onc iliation, was in effect th e ratification of the geop oliti-cal and ideological victory of the West.

It follows, therefore, tha t the end of this conflict, p articularly its one-sided outcome, has drastically altered the three central securityconsequences of the Cold War:

3



4 ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI

- first, polarization has given way to a condition of preponderance

by a single power on the world scene, although it must be hastilyadded that th is cond ition o ccurs in a setting of far greater diffusionof econom ic power and of political pluralism tha n one might expectin a hegemonic situation;

- second , regional conflicts are now decou pled from the earlier link-age with superpower rivalry. Regional conflicts may now be glo-bally less critical but, conversely, they may be freer to escalate tohigher levels of violence;

- third , pub lic politica l attentio n is likely to shift to other aspects ofinternational security - aspects perhaps better characterized asissues involving 'global well-being', such as poverty,underdevelopment and domestic instability.

The abo ve, however, merely describes the obviou s external manifes-tations of what is undeniably a major change in the nature of inter-national security. To grasp fully the meaning of that change and tocomprehend its longer-range policy implications, one must under-stand that the Cold War's end marks this century's third grand trans-formation of the organizing structure and of the motivating spirit ofglobal politics.

The first two great transformations did not enhance internationalsecurity. Will the third do so? The catalyst for the third transform ation- as just n oted - is the success of the W est and , more specifically, of theUnited States, in the recently ended Cold War. Much, therefore,depends on the geostrategic implications for the future that are nowdrawn from the conclusion of the Cold W ar, especially by Am erica andits principal partners in that prolonged engagement. 1

The three grand transformationsThe first transform ation was generated by the collapse of Euro pe's bal-ance of power and, thus, of Europe's decisive position in the world.Tha t balance had been sustained by several Europe-centred, bu t globe-spanning empires. Dominant worldwide and conservative in spirit,the European system - in existence since 1815 - eventually collapsedbecause it was neither able to assimilate the rise of the n ational powerof Germany , nor to con tain the centrifugal forces of rising cha uvinism .The first 'world' war was, in reality, the last European war fought byglobally significant European powers.

W orld War I gave rise to an abortive attem pt to organize Europe a ndthus, indirectly, the intern ational system as a whole, on the basis of anew principle: that of the supreme primacy of the nation-state, withnationalism fuelling political emotions. The result was a massive fail-ure. The new European order was too precarious to survive for long.With the territorial imperative igniting interstate conflicts, and withweak nation-states dotting the map of the new Europe, it was only aquestion of time before a new eruption occurred. Germany was again



CONSEQUENCES OF THE END OF THE COLD WAR 5

the precipitator, although not entirely the root cause, of the resulting

explosion.World War II, in reality the first truly global war, completedEurop e's historical suicide. In the course of it, Europe ceased to be theeffective centre of world politics and became instead the criticaltheatre of a global competition waged by two powerful extra-Europea nstates: Both of them realized that geostrategic control over Europewould be tantamount to eventual control over Eurasia, and controlover Eurasia w ould yield global prepo nde rance . Accordingly, through-out the resulting 'cold war', Europe was for each of them the centralstake - and th us Europe, instead of being the subject, now became theobject of a global contest.

This century's second great transformation of world politics - likethe first - also failed to enhance genuine international security. The

45-year-long conflict between the two superpow ers en tailed, first of all,enorm ous risks. With ideological hostility intensifying th eir arm s raceand w ith their arm s possessing for the first time a lethal capacity on aglobally de vastating scale, their rivalry was eno rmously costly in econ-omic terms and potentially devastating beyond comprehension.

Ultimately, th e U nited States was successful: first, in deterring the Sov-iet Union from gaining preponderance in Eurasia and, second, in dis-crediting its ideology and in exhausting it economically. Belated effortsby the Soviet leadership to set in motion a process of domestic renewalcreated openings for intensifying challenges to its control over vassalstates. The crisis of power in the K remlin and the sense of historical fail-ure of communism eventually caused the Soviet empire to disintegrate.

The Cold War thus ended without a hot war. In so doing, it gener-

ated fundam ental changes in two critical dimension s of world affairs:the geostrategic and the philosophical. In Eurasia, Soviet power notonly shrank back to its frontiers of 1940, but is now being challengedeven within its own borders. Indeed , the future survival of the S ovietsystem itself is now in doubt. Moreover, a united Germany is now inNATO, non-communist East European governments are cravingmem bership not only of the EC, bu t of NATO as well, and a politicallyindependent China is making steady progress in its pragmatic econ-omic modernization. Geostrategically, far from subjugating Eurasia,the Soviet Union is now on the defensive within it.

Moreover, the philosophical tenor of our time is now dom inated byW estern concepts of democracy a nd th e free m arket. Th is is not to saythat such concepts are being successfully implemented in the post-

communist states, but it is to assert that they represent today's pre-vailing wisdom. The competing notions of Marxism, not to speak ofits Leninist-Stalinist offshoot, once so intellectually dominant, aregenerally discredited.

It follows tha t the end of the Cold War - and p articularly its ratherone-sided geostrategic and philosophical outcome - has direct conse-quences for this century's third grand transformation of world poli-



6 ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINS KI

tics. If the first transformation can be said to have been fuelled by

nationalist aspirations within a Europe no longer capable of dominat-ing the world, but still capable of disrupting it, and the secondinvolved an ideologically intensified global contest between two non-European superpowers, the structure and the spirit of the third trans-formation are being increasingly shaped by the political and philo-sophical influence of the successful Western coalition.

In the course of the Cold War, that coalition acquired a comprehen-sive institutional character, embracing not only America and West-ern Europe, but increasingly Japan as well. Considerations of secur-ity, a shared interest in economic growth based on free world trade, acommitment to democratic policy-making and the impact of moderncommunications drove the coalition towards increasingly institution-alized co -operation. A s a result, in its internal relations the successful

coalition, increasingly came to manifest a pattern of conduct motiv-ated by what might be broadly (and somewhat clumsily) described asfunctionally pragmatic transnationalism.

Und oubtedly, impo rtant residues both of nationalism and of ideol-ogy continue to surface in the conduct of affairs even within thecoalition {and m uch mo re so in the world at large). But these imp ulsestend to be constrained by pragmatic considerations focused on themaximization of collective security and on the promotion of an openinternational trading system. Moreover, for the average citizen, theimperatives of consum ption are now more im portant than those of ter-ritory or doctrine. Neither the desire for complete national indepen-dence nor ideological self-righteousness is the dominant motivationshaping the coalition's public opin ion. As a result, functional pragm a-

tism, as well as transnational institution-building, generally tend todominate policy-making within the democratic West.

In the process, international politics - the interaction and struggleamong nation-states - are being transformed into a more organic pro-cess of global politics. That process tends to blur the distinctionbetween dom estic and foreign prio rities. It enhan ces the importa nce ofinternal economic and political well-being in determining the conductand the relative importance of individual states on the world arena.W ith nuclear weapons inhibiting the recourse to war among the lead-ing powers, global politics is becoming in some ways similar toAm erican urban centres: a mixture of interdependence and inequality,with violence concentrated in the poorer segments of society. Today,on the global scale, war has becom e a luxury that only the poor nation s

can afford.

New threats to international securityTraditionally, threats to international security have been defined interms of state-to-state relation s. This was especially the case in the agein which the nation-state was the principal vessel of decisive politicalaction. H owev er, in the em erging age of organic global politics it is jus t




as likely that major threats could originate from within states, either

through civil conflicts or because of the increased technologicalsophistication of terrorist acts.The character of the security challenges now facing the global com-

munity was dramatically defined by Jacques Delors, in his importantaddress in March 1991 to the HSS: 'All around us, naked ambition,lust for power, national uprisings and underdevelopment are combin-ing to create potentially dangerous situations, containing the seeds ofdestabilization and conflict, aggravated by the proliferation ofweapons of mass destruction'. That general description could beamplified by a long list of specific problems, some of them surfacingbecause of the end of the Cold War, some involving long-lastingregional conflicts, some being the legacies of imperialism, some likelyto rise because of the emergence of new regional powers, some

inherent in the inequality and poverty of the hum an cond ition - ma deworse by the population explosion - and all of them made potentiallymore lethal because of the inevitable continued spread of weapons ofmass destruction.

In these complex and dynamic circumstances, much depends onwhether the pragmatic transnationalism of the Cold War's successfulcoalition will becom e not only the defining, but also the endu ring sub-stance of this century's third transformation of global politics. Muchhinges on the way that four large structural dilemm as — each of centralrelevance to international security and each also a consequence of theend of the Cold W ar — are eventually resolved. The d ilemm as are:

- first, how will Europe eventually define itself — as a truly E urope an

Europe on a supranational basis, probably deeper before becomingwider, or as a Europe of closely co-operating states, perhaps widerbefore deeper? W hich is more likely to enh ance global security andwhich should America favour?

- two, how will the Soviet Un ion be transformed? Is its preservationin a reformed mode — for the sake of'stab ility' — desirable from thestandp oint of internation al secu rity, or is its progressive but funda-mental transformation ultimately the safest path towardsenhanced international security?

- thi rd, how will the Pacific region organize itself? Should the U Sremain decisively involved in the security arrangements of theregion, or should Japan be encouraged to assume the pre-eminentrole, consistent with its economic power? If Japan is to be so encour-

aged, how will this impact on regional security and, most notably,what is China's posture likely to be as a result?- the fourth structural dilemm a centres on the M iddle East. Can the

Un ited States, now so deeply absorbed in the Mid dle East's complexproblem s, afford not to prom ote energetically a framework of secur-ity and accommodation, or are the region's problems so intractablethat the w iser course dictates a policy of cautious diplomacy? Wh ich




is preferable from the standpoint of international security and

America's capacity to contribute?The answers to these questions will go a long way towards denning

either a system that is capable of containing and mitigating the newthreats to global security, or in yielding to a con dition of intensifyingglobal disorder. Each issue involves a series of critical and complexpolicy dilem mas. A positive deve lopm ent in the case of all— or, at themin imu m, in at least three of the four — would represent a major con-tribution to the emergence of politically and economically stabilizingzones of international co-operation, thereby enhancing the scope ofinternational security and reducing to a tolerable level the inevitablepresence on th e world scene of some degree of violence and conflict.

Defining Europe

Of special relevance here is the fact that the international landscape,specifically the distribution of global power, is being significantlyaltered by the acceleration in the processes of Europe's unification.The end of the division of Germ any - clearly, the m ost significant geo-political change produced by the end of the Cold War - has had thesomewhat unexpected effect of actually spurring the West Europeans(save for the British) into adopting a more ambitious timetable, notonly for econo mic integ ration, bu t also for the political, and eventuallymilitary, integration of their po rtion of the con tinent. W isely, the G er-mans themselves took the lead in this acceleration, strongly sup-ported by the French. Their hope is that by the end of the decade,W estern Eu rope will be emerging on th e global scene as an increasinglysingle-minded and purposeful player.

How ever, difficult de bates regarding Europe 's intern al o rganizationand its external boundaries are likely to dominate Europe's outlookthroug hou t much of this decade . Two major vision s of Euro pe's futureare currently colliding, and Am erica will at some po int have to m ake aclear choice between them. One vision was eloquently articulated byJacques Delors in his previously me ntione d ad dress. He posed in it thecentral question: 'W hat d estiny are we propo sing to the people of Eur-ope? What destiny and what ambition?'

His answer was clear-cut. It should be an integrated Europ e, 'a com-munity based on the union of peoples and the association of nation-states pursuing common objectives and developing a Europeanidentity'. Such a Europe should, therefore, have its own defence pol-

icy, a policy that would represent 'the second pillar of the AtlanticAlliance' with the Unite d S tates. The EC would thus be the political, aswell as econo mic, framework for the expression of a European identitythat is comprehensive and increasingly organic.

The alternative vision was forcefully defined by Margaret Thatcherin a speech to the Heritage Foundation in Washington on 8 March1991. Thatcher warned that: 'If a European superstate were to be




forged, it would almost certainly develop interests and attitudes at

variance w ith those of Am erica. We would thereby move from a stableinternational order with the United States in the lead to a moredangerous world of new competing power blocs. This would be in noone's interest, least of all America's'. Accordingly, she expressed anexplicit preference for 'a Eu rope of nation-states, a Europe that is openas soon as possible to participa tion of those Eu ropean states currentlyoutside of the European Community, notably the democratizing statesof post-commun ist East Europe'.

Inhere nt in these two competing visions are sensitive security issues.Two stand out: first, what is the scope of the We st's security p erime terin Europe; second, what is the proper American role in Europeansecurity? As Eastern Europ e dem ocratizes itself — at first, in the mo repromising Polish-Czech-Hungarian triangle — NATO's security per-

imeter is already beginning implicitly to include these countries.As that security perimeter shifts eastward, and as European econ-omic integration moves forward, further dynamics in favour of pol-itical and military integration are likely to be generated. Europe willcertainly need political cohesion and a joint security policy to dealwith its potential ethnic or regional problems. It may even chosoe toadopt the European equivalent of the Mon roe Doctrine in that regard,and, in this connection, the energetic response of the EC to theYugoslav crisis represents an important and positive precedent.

Such a development would be consistent with the American desirefor a genuinely pluralistic and self-governing world. A Europe with adefined military and political identity would certainly continue tohave an interest in a strategic alliance with the United States. That

alliance would be the guarantee against any potential revival in theSoviet military threat and w ould serve as the basis for join t responses— if joint interests are involved — to out-of-area threats.

For this reason it is historically unwise for America to opposegreater European military integration, especially through the linkageof the EC and the WEU. Economic unity cannot be insulated fromeventual political and military unity. Official US insistence on pre-serving NATO as the central military decision-making body seems toindicate an A merican preference for a Europe tha t still rema ins a Eur-ope of nation-states, contrary to American rhetoric about support forEuropean unity.

The troubling inconsistency between the American desire that Eur-ope be more active, not only in safeguarding itself, but also in

assuming out-of-area roles, and the American insistence that the ECrefrain from becoming the mechanism for defining Europe's securitypolicy has another negative aspect. It ignores the historicallysignificant reality that a more united Europe would be also a Europemore capable of absorbing and assimilating Germany. That wouldmake unlikely any potential German-Russian manoeuvres that, inturn, could revive old European insecurities. One cannot dismiss the




possibility — however remote today — that in a fluid Europe and in a

messy Soviet Union, both Berlin and Moscow could again someday betempted.A more self-reliant and reliable Europ e, in which America m aintain s

only limited grou nd forces, but wh ich it backs with its strategic deter-ren t, would also be less vuln erable to th e nega tive spillove r effects —both social and political — of the deep ening Soviet crisis. Theimplosion of the Soviet Union is almost certain to continue. A long-term decomposition of the Soviet political and economic system isunder way.

The transformation of the Soviet Union

The national crisis within the Soviet Union introduces a particularlyemotional complication, making it all the more difficult to construct an

all-union framework conducive to political comp romise an d congenialto rapid economic recovery. Mo re likely is a protracted period of uncer-tainty, as the Soviet Union is transformed - both through evolutionand periodic turbulence — into som ething eventually quite different.

During this period of change, the Soviet geopolitical relationshipwith Eastern Eu rope may be quite un stable, with fears and anxieties onboth sides. The East Europeans fear both Soviet power and Sovietweakness. They know that not all Soviet leaders have become rec-onciled to the geopolitical loss of Eastern Europe. They are con-cerned that the continuing security vacuum in the region could againbe filled by Soviet power. East Europeans follow carefully Sovietinternal debates about Soviet policy towards the region, and they arenot reassured by all they read.

Basically, two lines of thought have emerged in Moscow regardingEastern E urope. Some com men tators have been urging a policy con-sistent with the 'new thinking' that is said to characterize MikhailGorbachev's foreign policy, viewing Eastern Europe, and especiallyPolan d, 'as the door-step to the W est. . . Moscow m ust avoid usingforce and seek compromises as it does in Washington, Bonn andParis'.2 However, more frequently there have been charges that: 'Sov-iet policy in Eastern Europe is operating without a precise strategicconcept, w ithout a clear definition of aims ', which is not only facilitat-ing the spread of Western influence, but is even permitting the newEast European leaders to engage in activities aimed at 'the USSR'ssocialist perspective and existence as an integral state'. 3

These public debates mirror the more serious disagreements w ithinthe Soviet Union regarding relations with Eastern Europe. By andlarge, the Soviet Foreign Ministry reflected the more benign attitudetowards changes in Eastern Europe. In contrast, a directive of theInternational Department of the Central Committee of the CPSU,issued in January 1991 , urged the use of political and econo mic lever-age ('energy exports to Eastern Europe must be viewed as an import-




ant in strum ent of our strategy in the region') to restore some degree of

Soviet influence.Even a cursory glance at a map suggests that the main thrust of anySoviet effort to redress the geop olitical situatio n is likely to be d irectedat Poland . From the Soviet point of view, the restoration of some degreeof control over Poland would greatly reduce the m om entum of the cen-trifugal forces now at work in Lithuan ia, Byelorussia and th e Uk rain e.

But it is not only the reapp lication of Soviet power that w orries theEast Europeans: Soviet weakness is another source of concern. Exist-ing trade patterns have already been unilaterally severed by the Sov-iets, with a very adverse impact on East European economies. TheEast Europeans fear that an internal catastrophe in the Soviet Unioncould precipitate m assive migration to the W est, on a scale perhaps ofeven as many as several million refugees. The fragile East European

states could not handle such a situation.One must expect, therefore, considerable uncertainty as regards theSoviet relationship w ith Eastern E urope . This is essentially why the EastEuropean governments h ave been favouring a policy of some W esternaid for the Soviet Union, but aid which also deliberately facilitates therestoration of disrupted trad e flows between East Europe an d the SovietUn ion. Th is is also why, until some alternative em erges, NATO , with itsAmerican presence, has come to be viewed by the East Europeans astheir primary source of security. For the East Europeans, the CSCE -given its rule of una nim ity, which places on the same level such entitiesas the Soviet Union and Monaco - could become an effective securitysystem only when insecurity no longer exists.

The foregoing underlines the shared stake both of the East and the

West in the peaceful and stable transform ation - and not just reform -of the Soviet Un ion. It is in the collective interest of the W est, and ofinternational security more generally, that Western policy has as itsstrategic objective the progressive strengthening of the political andeconom ic power of the variou s Soviet nation al republics, thereby gen-erating a dynamic process that will eventually replicate the pluralismthat already characterizes the West. Ultimately, the Soviet Unionmight thu s evolve into a looser confederation, o r a league of sovereignstates, with associate status in specific security and economic mattersfor those Soviet republics that opt for complete independence.

In a Soviet confederation, the existing Soviet Army, a hugemultinational establishment based on compulsory military service,might gradually be transformed into a smaller, professional military

formation, presumably subject to the confederal government. How-ever, some of the republics have indicated that they might choose tomaintain separate national conventional forces, perhaps of the USNational Guard type.

4The con federal governm ent wou ld also be likely

to exercise control over the existing Soviet strategic forces, probablystaffed in the main by Russian nationals, but there would be anarrangement - perhaps as in NATO - for a republican role in the




decision-making regarding the use of such forces. In this fashion, the

enorm ous Soviet nuclear arsenal would eventually be decoupled fromthe single most powerful conventional army in the world, therebysomewhat mitigating the threat that Soviet military power still posesto the West.

Clearly, any such prospect is still far off. Movement in that directioncould be derailed by a sudden reversal in internal Soviet politics,including some belated attempt at centralized dictatorship. Moreover,even sustained m ovem ent is likely to be subject to periodic ha lts, somereversals, mu ch friction and some turbulence. Non etheless, the benignscenario outlined above - which can no longer be relegated to therealm of political science fiction - is already being discussed in theSoviet Un ion. It therefore reinforces the propo sition tha t the vision ofa transformed Soviet Union should serve as a strategic beacon for

Western policy. And a politically united Europe, together with Amer-ica, can assist more deliberately such a peaceful transformation thana Europe tha t itself rema ins susceptible to interna l nationa l rivalries.

Relations in the PacificThe third structural challenge to global security in the post-Cold Warera involves the Far East. Irrespective of what actually transpires inthe foreseeable future in the Soviet Union, shared security concernsare now less likely to mitigate the intensifying American-Japaneseeconom ic rivalry. A mo re deliberate effort, therefore, will be neede d todefine the substance of a genuine partnership between America andJapa n. Fo rtunately, on bo th sides of the Pacific there is a growing rec-ognition of the emerging economic-financial interdependence and

interpenetration of the two econom ies.In the mea ntim e, the security question in that relation ship will haveto be addressed within a strategic perspective that is sensitive tobroad er regional dynam ics. The Pacific region, although economicallynow the most vital sector of the global economy, lacks any viablesecurity structure. Tha t absence was not a major problem as long as thecentral security issue was the American-Soviet rivalry. However, inthe nea r future, C hina, given its relatively successful econom ic trans-formation, is likely to emerge as a geopolitical power conten der in thePacific region. This alone is bound to have a major impact on theregion, potentially prompting a significant shift in the Asian powerbalance away from US and/or Japanese preponderance.

Indeed , it is quite likely that, within a decade or two, the security of

the Fa r East will be as dram atically transformed by the emergence of amore powerful China as the security of Europe has been transformedby the fading power of the Soviet Un ion. If present trends co ntinue, bythe year 2010 China will join the United States, the EC and Japan asone of the wo rld's four leading econo mic pow ers. It may even make itspolitical and military weight in world affairs felt earlier - a prospectthat has to be taken into account.




In any case, a much more complex interplay, involving not only

Japan and China, but other regional players too, is already in the pro-cess of gestation. A unified Korea, for example, could even be anuclear power. Indonesia is likely to be more assertive in South-eastAsia. India clearly is already a regional hegemon in South Asia, as wellas a nuclear power. It is unclear whether in the years to come Indiamight suffer from significant internal insecurity or whether it mightseek to play a more a ssertive role in a wider Asian context. Mo reover,the list of potential interstate as well as internal conflicts in Asia cer-tainly far exceeds that of Europe.

The United States is determined to remain a Pacific power, with itsforces projected to the edges of the Asian mainland. Yet, at the sametime, the U nited States desires Japan to assume a larger military role onthe grounds that this behooves its standing as an economic giant and as

an emerging global power. The longer-term danger arising from suchpressures on Japan is that at some po int either a serious clash betweenAmerica and Japan over US geostrategic perspectives may develop, ortha t Japa n, forced for the first time since W orld W ar II to define its owngeopolitical priorities, will plunge into a security role that goes farbeyond anything that the American side had actually desired.

It is, therefore, far from clear that it is truly in America's interest topressure Japan into assuming larger military responsibilities. Theproblem is likely to be compounded by increased Chinese resentmentregarding American strategy. Chinese commentaries on the 'world'sstrategic pattern' make it clear that, in its view: 'Europe is no longerthe focus of [the] world strategic patter n, while the strategic position ofthe Asia-Pacific region is rising'.

5This makes the Chinese even more

concerned that the Asian region has not yet developed a regionalsecurity struc ture similar to that of Europ e, one which could assim ilateJapan in a manner akin to that of Germany in Europe.

The answ er to the region's longer-term security dilemm as is thus notlikely to be derived from a m ore militarily powerful Ja pan nor from anAmerica permanently perched on the edge of the Asian mainland. Itcertainly is not desirable to generate a dynam ic and destabilizing inter-play between a more militaristic Japan, an antagonistically assertiveChina , and a beleaguered Russia. Instead, in the wake of the Cold W ar,the West should exploit the opportunity to participate in shaping thenew structure of Asian security which will gradually embrace themajor powers and interested states, especially China.

Perha ps two sets of negotiations will, at some po int, be needed - one

pertaining to North-east Asia and the other to South-east Asia. Thefirst might focus particularly on the need to ge nerate a four-power con-sensus on the reunification of Korea. The second might build on theagreements regarding Cambodia to create some standing consultativemachinery for the resolution of territorial and/or political conflicts.

In both cases, the point of departure for any initiative should beclose consultations and co-ordination between America and Japan. An




enduring alliance between the two - but neither a US military protec-

torate nor a regional Japanese military role - is the essential foun-dation for Asian security. Progress along these lines should permitthe progressive p ull-back ofAm erican forces from forward b ases in thePhilippines, Korea and eventually, perhaps, from Japan as well. Thisshould be viewed not as a symptom of American isolationism, but asconsistent with the gradual emergence on the world scene of new andwider-ranging security structures of regional self-reliance.

Peace in the Middle EastThe fourth major consequence of the Cold War's end was the freedomof action th at the United States enjoyed in conducting the war againstIraq. The Soviet Unio n had little real choice but to play the role of abenevolent - even if eventually also of an increasingly frustrated -

spectator. It was no longer Am erica's contestant for regional influence.However, the military victory attained in that war has plunged Amer-ica into a deep, probably protracted, political and military absorptionin the Middle East's various crises.

Regional power is now concentrated at two extremes: Iran is theonly self-reliant military power in the Gulf, and Israel has no Arabmilitary match. T hus, in the Gulf, the Un ited States will have to be theprincipal source of security. Perhap s over time a newpolitical relation-ship with Iran can be structured, but that certainly remains an uncer-tain prospect. In the meantime, the very weakness of the Gulf Arabstates, their continued vital economic impo rtance to the West, as wellas the unresolved legacies of the militarily decisive, but politicallyinconclusive outcome of the war against Iraq dictate the necessity of a

continued American military presence.At onepoint, it was argued that the successful destruction of Iraq bya We stern-A rab coalition, which enjoyed Israel's benign self-restraint,would create the preconditions for movement towards a solution ofthe Arab-Israeli conflict. That prospect now seems more doubtful.Relieved of the potential threat from Iraq, the Israelis are moreinclined to insist on their maximum objective: the permanent reten-tion of the West Bank. The Arabs, reeling from the defeat of Iraq by amassive display of American power, are in no position either to makewar or to settle with Israel largely on Israeli terms.

Accordingly, the danger is of a gridlock, but one that runs the risk ofabsorbing American attention, diverting American resources and per-haps even stalemating American diplomacy. Even though the Middle

East is now unambiguously a US sphere of influence, the paradoxicalresult ofAm erica's military victory over Iraq might be the reduction ofits capacity to capitalize more broadly and constructively on the end ofthe Cold War to make a substantial contribution to internationalsecurity writ large.

Ultimately, the issue is that of Am erican p olitical will to sustain theneeded peace process. The international community basically knows




what the interrelated agenda of peace in the Middle East involves: the

shaping of a viable security framework that also constrains the inflowof arms; the implementation of UN Resolutions 242 and 338 regard-ing the Israeli-Arab conflict, including some transitional politicalstatus for the P alestinian na tion; and p rogress toward s a regional pa rt-nership in economic development.

An assertive American effort to shape such a genuine framework ofpolitical compromise and regional security in the Middle East woulddoubtless enjoy the sup port of the major co untries in Europe and A sia.It would be seen as in keeping with progress towards genuinelyenhanced international security.

ConclusionTo co nclude, internation al security in the post-Cold W ar era is likely

to depend on the degree to which:- Europe succeeds both in deepening its political and military unity

(without too much delay), then in widening its scope;- the transformation of the existing Soviet Un ion into a loose and vol-

untary confederation is neither halted by a sudden throwback tocentral dictatorship nor produces violent explosions;

- mov emen t develops in the Far East towards a regional security accom-modation that constructively engages Japan, China, the UnitedStates, perhaps the Soviet Union and some other pertinent states;

- the Unite d States, which has becom e the decisive security arbiter inthe M iddle East, energetically sets in motio n a regional peace process.

In regard to the above issues, the Am erican role in the years to com e

will remain central. How Europe evolves will be influenced to somedegree by US policies and presence. The way in which the SovietUn ion copes will be affected by the strategic design tha t the successfulCold War coalition adopts. How the Far East organizes itself will beconditioned by the role that the United States insists on playing. Anddevelopments in the Middle East will depend very heavily on thedegree to which W ashington elects to play a passive or an active part.Indeed, the Am erican role in helping to shape the answ ers will be criti-cal simply because today's global politics include only one super-power, the United States.

However, the special status afforded America as the world's onlysuperpower is threatened by its domestic shortcomings. To be sure, itwould be rash to underestimate the innate capacity of American

society for rapid renovation. A burst of economic and technologicalrenewal could well be sparked, thereby drastically reversing some ofthe downward trends in the country's economic indices experiencedduring the 1990s. Non etheless, unless America pays more attention toits domestic weaknesses, a new global pecking order could begin toemerge early in the next century, in the even t that th e unifying Europeand/or an economically dynamic Japan were to assume large political



1 6 ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI

and military responsibilities. Thus it follows that, h enceforth, U S pol-

icy will have to strike a more deliberate balance between the globe'sneed for a continuing American commitment, the desirability of somedevolution of US regional security respon sibilities and th e im perativesof Am erica's dom estic renewal. This will require a mo re subtle Ameri-can contribution to sustaining global security than was the case dur-ing the Cold War. More emphasis will have to be placed onco-operation with genuine partners, including shared decision-makingregarding world security issues. It is also worth noting tha t Am ericaninfluence is, in fact, likely to be greater if the hom eward redeploy men tof some of its forces precedes - and not follows - the host countries'demand for it.

The emerging new global system thu s is likely to be based n either onAmerican hegemony nor yet be derived from genuine internationalharmony. Although America is today admittedly the world's onlysuperpower, global conditions are too complex and America's dom-estic health too precarious to sustain a worldwide Pax Americana.Eventually, perhaps , a truly new world order, based on consensus, ruleof law and peaceful adjudication of disputes, may become a reality.But th at da y is still far off. As of now, the ph rase is a slogan in search ofsubstantive m eaning.

Nor is isolationism - given the emergence of the global economyand the impact of modern co mm unications - a practical option. Thusthe real alternatives are either a world of intensifying disorder - with adivided E urope, a Soviet Un ion plunging into violent chaos, a Far Eastdestabilized by new power shifts, and a M iddle East of continu ed con-flict cumulatively producing a catastrophic breakdown in globalsecurity - or an incipient global security structure, derived fromwidening and increasingly self-reliant regional co-operation, backedby selective and proportionate American commitments.

W ithin such a global security structure, Am erica - even with a dim-inished military presence abroad - will still remain the principalsource of nuclear deterrence and the ultimate guarantor of the prop-osition that any disrupter of security will be faced by a dominantcoalition, in all likelihood, still led by America. At the same time,Washington will be able to focus more on the imperatives of its dom-estic renewal, thereby buttressing its long-term capacity to sustain apolicy of continued, but also more selective and proportionate, com-mitment to global security.

Notes1

The debate on this subject has beenjoined, and I have benefited from thearguments already developed by others,notably from the American vantagepoint in seminal statements by Samuel

P. Huntington and Paul Nitzerespectively. See S. P. Huntington,'America's changing strategic interests',Survival, vol. XXXIII, No. 1, Jan/Feb1991, pp. 3-17; and P. Nitze, 'America:




an Honest Broker', Foreign A ffairs, Fall,1990.2 V. Razuvayev, 'The West Begins inPoland', New Times, 12-18 February1991.3

A. Kaznacheyev, 'USSR-East Europe:Hopes and Illusions', SovetskayaRossiya, 17 April 1991.4

V. Semivolos, 'Should the Ukrainehave its Own Army?', Novoye Vremya,no . 26, June 1991, discusses in detail theproblematics of future Ukrainian armedforces, and reaches the conclusion that'taking into consideration the future

professionalization of the army and therenunciation of nuclear weapons and the

corresponding maintenance, backup, anddelivery systems, the numerical strengthof the Army will drop to 200,000 -300,000' from the approximately700,000 Ukrainians who are currentlyserving in the Soviet Army.5

Chen Xiaogong, 'The World's StrategicPattern in the 1990s', InternationalStrategic Studies, (Beijing), March1991), pp. 8-9. Chen's p eriodization ofchange in world affairs is in somerespects quite similar to mine.

brzezinski | the consequensces of the end of the cold war for international security

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