Diplomacy: Russia, China

There’s been a flurry of news today, much of it related in one way or another to the economy. The news has been mostly bad to very bad, with promises of worse to come. Nevertheless, I want to draw attention to two posts at Moon of Alabama that illustrate where the decades long downward trajectory of what passes for US “diplomacy” has landed us.

Readers may be familiar with the Brittney Griner case and recent public statements by the US about making a deal with Russia with regard to that case. Griner is basketball player who was arrested in Russia for attempting to smuggle cannabis oil into the country. The details are unimportant—the long and the short is that Griner is being held in Russia pending trial. At the same time a former Marine is also being held by Russia under much more serious espionage charges. Russia claims that Paul Whelan is a CIA asset, and the fact that Whelan had passports from four different countries lends credence to that claim. The Russians claim Whelan was arrested in possession of a thumb drive containing a list of FSB officers (that’s the successor organization to the KGB). Again, the details are unimportant.

What’s going on, and is a new development, is that Tony Blinken, who purports to be our top diplomat, came out publicly this week and announced that he was initiating a kind of game of let’s-make-a-deal with Russia. The idea is: Russia releases our two people and we’ll release an alleged Russian arms smuggler that we’re holding. I’ll admit that my initial reaction—especially with regard to Griner—was that this whole thing was mostly to do with domestic US politics. Moon discusses this in considerable detail, but his perspective is apparent from the post’s title, and deserves serious consideration:

A Panicking Biden Administration Seeks Talks With Russia

The first thing to understand, as Moon explains, is that Blinken is not following the normal diplomatic practice in such cases. Normally we wait for the court proceedings to conclude, and normally such swaps are not discussed publicly. What’s going on?

What’s going on is suggested by the Russian response. According to the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov is too busy talking to Africans and Arabs to respond to the USA. But he will—when he has the time. At some undefined point in the future. In the meantime, don’t bother calling.

Moon’s argument is that this refusal to deal with the lightweight Blinken has probably been ongoing for some time. Indeed, Moon quotes the WaPo to that effect: the US has, for weeks, been trying unsuccessfully to get Russia’s attention—and so the US has broken protocol and gone public. Meanwhile, matters in Ukraine have been going from bad to worse as far as the US is concerned. Putin has openly stated that the longer the conflict continues—which is a matter entirely under his control at this point—the harder the West (= the US) will find Russia to deal with. Lavrov has even more recently stated that Russia’s goals have now expanded, which means that the conflict will continue and that Russia is in no particular hurry to come to any negotiated settlement, since it holds all of the cards—steady progress in Ukraine and approaching economic and political collapse in multiple NATO countries.

Viewed from this perspective, Moon argues that the Griner gambit is a sign that a panicking Zhou regime is desperately engaging in various antics in an attempt to get Russia to talk to them. Veteran India diplomat M. K. Bhadrakumar explains:

Blinken then came to the real purpose of his forthcoming call with Lavrov — “the plans that Russia now has to pursue the annexation of Ukrainian territory.”

Blinken repeated the hyperbole that sanctions are having “a powerful and also growing effect” and has “weakened Russia profoundly” and the Biden administration will do all that it can “to strengthen Ukraine’s position on the battlefield so it has the strongest possible position at the negotiating table.”

However, what comes through is the growing disquiet in Washington that to its utter disbelief, the Russian stance has only hardened lately. Blinken said it is “causing alarms.” In particular, he noted Lavrov’s remark last week that the Kremlin’s goals in Ukraine had expanded. “Now they seek to claim more Ukrainian territory, beyond the Donbas,” he commented.

Indeed, the war has spun out of US algorithm. As Hungarian PM Orban pointed out last week, anti-Russian sanctions “have not shaken Moscow,” but Europe has already lost four governments and is in an economic and political crisis.

Russia is paying back to the US and NATO in the same coin that the latter did when they dismembered Yugoslavia.

By the way, I highly recommend Bhadrakumar’s entire article. He adds in conclusion:

The spectre of the collapse of EU economies is rattling the Biden Administration. A CNN report yesterday was titled US officials say ‘biggest fear’ has come true as Russia cuts gas supplies to Europe. It said the Biden administration “is working furiously behind the scenes to keep European allies united” as the blowback from the sanctions against Russia hits them  and the “impact on Europe could boomerang back onto the US, spiking natural gas and electricity prices.” 

The report quoted an unnamed US official saying Russia’s retaliation for western sanctions has put the West in “unchartered [sic] territory.” Suffice to say, Blinken’s call underscores the desperate urgency in Washington to open a line of communication to Moscow at the political level. 

How this volte-face plays out in European capitals, especially Kiev remains to be seen. Blinken led the western boycott of Lavrov at the G20 Foreign Ministers’ Meeting in Bali as recently as July 7-8. President Biden extended a glamorous welcome to Zelensky’s wife Olena Zelenska to the White House who was on a high-profile visit last week, even as Blinken was preparing his stunning announcement. 

So we see Blinken, having repeatedly snubbed and insulted Russia, desperately trying to get some acknowledgement of the US’s existence from a Russia that believes it holds all the cards. Obviously the Russian’s are asking: What’s in it for us?

But this is par for the course when it comes to US “diplomacy”. In the rules based order the US makes the rules, that is, plays by it’s own rules. But Russia is now in a position to refuse that game. From Russia’s perspective the US has repeatedly and aggressively sought to overthrow the governments of countries surrounding Russia. Most egregiously, the US overthrew the government of Ukraine and has been preparing its vassal Ukraine regime for war with Russia. Now the US has launched a war against Russia—militarily through its Ukraine vassal and economically through direct sanctions with the avowed intention of reducing the ruble to rubble, of bringing Russia to its knees. Why would Russia throw Zhou and Davos a lifeline at this point, when the US is behind a war that is costing Russian (and Ukrainian) lives. If the Zhou regime really thinks that using US missiles to damage a bridge in Ukraine (and those missiles were almost certainly launched by NATO personnel using US guidance systems) will get the Russians to buckle, they’re delusional.

Moon concludes:

The Washington Post writer, as well as the whole Biden administration, has some serious delusions about Russia's role in the now multipolar world.

Lavrov, Peskov and Maria Zakharova are experienced professionals. If one wants to talk with them one should be on a similar level.

Blinken does not even come near to that.

Americans, typically, aren’t much interested in these matters. However, most of the rest of the world is watching, as the US is humbled by its own hubris.

Now, China.

This will undoubtedly upset some, but Moon again addresses the disconnect between US actions—the provocative proposed visit of Pelosi to Taiwan, with concurrent naval maneuvers in the South China Sea—and the reality of a changed and now multi-polar world:

Provoking Beijing

Readers may argue with Moon’s interpretation of history, however he makes some important points, with repeated references to Yves Smith at Naked Capitalism. Moon suggests that Pelosi is playing to the domestic political scene—China bashing is well received, even as the US receives so much of the products it relies upon (but no longer manufactures) from China. However, and this plays into American delusions, the hand we hold against China is nowhere near as strong as we think it is, and it could lead us into serious trouble. For context, consider:

Taiwan is 6500 miles from San Francisco. If you want to quibble, then it’s about 5000 miles from Honolulu.

Taiwan is about 100 miles from China.

What are we playing at—are we really the world cop that we think we are? As long ago as the 1970s Adm. Stansfield Turner was pointing out the vulnerability of carrier battle groups to attack from peer or near peer powers. Guess what? China now falls in that category. No matter what we may think of the Chinese government, China is a proud civilizational area and will not be inclined to accept bullying—especially from the crass likes of Pelosi and Blinken. The Pentagon has warned against this trip, but US politicians, well.

In that light …

Yves Smith is aghast about the U.S. eyepoking of China:

The neocons above all seem unable to process that the days of US hegemony are over. It boggles the mind that they are not just eyepoking but escalating greatly with China via the still-planned Pelosi visit to Taiwan in August. As we’ll explain, China is fully cognizant of the fact that Pelosi is number two in line after Harris should something happen to the increasingly addle-brained Biden. And they don’t buy for a second that Pelosi is operating without the explicit approval of the Administration.

Note that it’s entirely possible that Pelosi revived her Taiwan trip plan (recall she put it off after coming down with Covid) all on her own. The Pentagon gave her a face-saving out by saying they didn’t recommend it.

China, which is routinely screechy when it is upset about what it perceives to be foreign transgressions, has managed to find new registers in its objections the proposed Pelosi visit.

Pelosi is not only number two in line but has been hostile to the Chinese government for more than 30 years.

…

Pelosi may think she can recreate another positive media echo by traveling to Taiwan.

But the China of 2022 is no longer the China of 1991. It is now the world's biggest economy and its military force rivals the one the U.S. has. It no longer condones eyepoking and 'human rights' stunts. It knows a U.S. provocation when it sees one.

…

Yves says that China is ready to respond should the planned Pelosi stunt take place:

If the Chinese level of ire is any guide, having Chinese fighter jets deny Pelosi a landing in Taiwan is on the mild end of possible responses. If that were to happen and the plane was escorted to land in mainland China, I could see the Chinese rubbing salt in the wound by not letting anyone in the aircraft deplane.

China is considering how to use a Pelosi visit to set far more important precedents. Hu in the Global Times clip above mentioned declaring a no-fly zone or having PLA jets fly with Pelosi’s plane into Taiwan airspace. As the Global Times noted: “That would set a great precedent for the PLA to patrol above the island, which would be far more meaningful than Pelosi’s visit.”

As with provoking Russia, the US may be about to get what it sought with Taiwan and find out that the results are not to its advantage. And as an American, it’s depressing to see so much incompetence and arrogance on display.

Taiwan is part of China. This is by the way also the official position of the government in Taipei. But seen from Beijing that government is only that of a Chinese province and not one that is allowed to have an independent foreign policy. Any attempt to change that will see strong resistance from Beijing, if necessary by force.

The U.S. government is currently watching as its proxy force in the Ukraine gets systematically dismantled by Russia which is destined to win that war. There is nothing that the U.S. can do about that. Any conflict around Taiwan would have a similar outcome.

Washington may think that would be a great opportunity to isolate China.

But isolate from whom? It would be the U.S. and its allies which would be most hurt by it while the much larger rest of the world would simply continue to work with China just as it does now with Russia.

But with incompetence and arrogance ruling in Washington (and Brussels) one can no exclude that that is exactly their plan.

I thought that the US would back down from the war with Russia, but I was wrong. I think the US will back down from war with China. Maybe I’ll be right this time.

In any event, the US is the loser. The limits of US power are being brutally exposed in Ukraine (and elsewhere), and our NATO and EU network of global control is being systematically dismantled. War with China is a losing proposition for the US, but now the US has positioned itself in a corner. Backing down will also be a major defeat for the US, and a significant empowerment for China. We’re in a global no-win position, and it’s no one’s fault but our own.

Well, this Zhou regime is what our power elites wanted.