By Bernard Rowan
Sadly, the evil and tyrannical foolishness of Putin and the Russian leadership has reached a new low with the war in Ukraine. War crimes occur on the backs of conscripts. Civilian targets suffer indiscriminately. Far from "Making Russia Great Again," Putin has sealed his fate as the 21st century's worst international leader, with damning parallels to Hitler. Nevertheless, Ukraine will not lose this conflict. This moment marks an unraveling in autocracy's recent melodrama of injustice. Russia's pullback to consolidate something less than the original delusion unfolds. In its wake, the world realizes a new bipolarity.
The war in Ukraine reveals a bipolarity forming in global relations. The Alliance of Freedom and the Axis of Autocracy exist today, including with what qualifies as a proxy war in Ukraine. The United States, Europe, Japan, South Korea and Australia form one pole. China, the silent "non-condemning" leader of the Axis, forms an alternate pole with team members Russia (pretenses aside), Iran, North Korea and other states. The Axis of Autocracy stands against the status quo of liberal internationalism, democracy and capitalism. The conflict in Ukraine amounts to a war between a declining power, Russia, which also is China's proxy, and a resilient Ukraine, the Alliance's proxy. There also are important fence-sitters like India and Turkey. Other participants in the forming bipolarity are the weakly aligned and unaligned states.
Realists analyze the Ukraine War as a waste of time and blame the Alliance of Freedom for intruding on Russia's border and boundaries. Their analyses have the credibility of received opinion but fail to consider the broader reality. The power relations for freedom and democracy want attention to realist analysis but also something more than simple acceptance of its conclusions. The horizon of global democracies remains a project, just as does the Axis of Autocracies. These rival visions and investments vector the respective poles of the international order in societies, cultures and their power.
The Ukraine War will teach lessons. I speak to one chapter of them, the need to support and uphold democracies. This includes nascent or partial versions of democracies. Global stability depends on it. Foreign policy toward Ukraine and the other former Soviet republics, now free states, long has needed something more than rhetoric by NATO, the EU and the United States. The same holds true for Africa, India and Southeast Asia. Real investment to encourage democracies is better than supplying weaponry after a war begins.
China is busily at work, investing billions and trillions of dollars to shore up new autocracies and fledgling partners. The Belt and Road and blue water navy projects unfold with a host of only seemingly unsuspecting clients. Axis political clients will align with China, or risk stasis following Chinese investments, influence and control. The Alliance for Freedom should learn again how shortchanging investments in others threatens the national interest and endangers global order. Formerly unheard-of partners, say the Solomon Islands, now openly turn to join the Axis of Autocracy. This will need more investments in deterrence. Investment isn't an idea confined to personal moneymaking.
The forming bipolarity has greater breadth. Global development continues across both poles and the straddlers and unaligned. Multiple states have nuclear weapons, and more want them. The Alliance for Freedom must increase its security investments, focusing on military realities, soft power and development of democratic potential. More states demand attention. Sadly, this realist logic continues to unfold, multiplying the potential for global conflict.
In all of this, I think it's both sad and important that whatever North Korea pretends to is of less importance than what China does about security relations. This doesn't mean South Korea need not continue to develop her powers and advanced economy as a leader in the Alliance for Freedom ― quite the contrary. The Japan-Russia World War II peace negotiations take a back seat. Hopes for unification and the end of North Korea will too. The real problem is a forming bipolar competition between the Axis of Autocracy and the Alliance for Freedom. It isn't enough to summarize that as China versus the United States anymore.
Bernard Rowan (browan10@yahoo.com) is the associate provost for contract administration and a professor of political science at Chicago State University. He is a past fellow of the Korea Foundation and a former visiting professor at Hanyang University.
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The war in Ukraine reveals a bipolarity forming in global relations. The Alliance of Freedom and the Axis of Autocracy exist today, including with what qualifies as a proxy war in Ukraine. The United States, Europe, Japan, South Korea and Australia form one pole. China, the silent "non-condemning" leader of the Axis, forms an alternate pole with team members Russia (pretenses aside), Iran, North Korea and other states. The Axis of Autocracy stands against the status quo of liberal internationalism, democracy and capitalism. The conflict in Ukraine amounts to a war between a declining power, Russia, which also is China's proxy, and a resilient Ukraine, the Alliance's proxy. There also are important fence-sitters like India and Turkey. Other participants in the forming bipolarity are the weakly aligned and unaligned states.
Realists analyze the Ukraine War as a waste of time and blame the Alliance of Freedom for intruding on Russia's border and boundaries. Their analyses have the credibility of received opinion but fail to consider the broader reality. The power relations for freedom and democracy want attention to realist analysis but also something more than simple acceptance of its conclusions. The horizon of global democracies remains a project, just as does the Axis of Autocracies. These rival visions and investments vector the respective poles of the international order in societies, cultures and their power.
The Ukraine War will teach lessons. I speak to one chapter of them, the need to support and uphold democracies. This includes nascent or partial versions of democracies. Global stability depends on it. Foreign policy toward Ukraine and the other former Soviet republics, now free states, long has needed something more than rhetoric by NATO, the EU and the United States. The same holds true for Africa, India and Southeast Asia. Real investment to encourage democracies is better than supplying weaponry after a war begins.
China is busily at work, investing billions and trillions of dollars to shore up new autocracies and fledgling partners. The Belt and Road and blue water navy projects unfold with a host of only seemingly unsuspecting clients. Axis political clients will align with China, or risk stasis following Chinese investments, influence and control. The Alliance for Freedom should learn again how shortchanging investments in others threatens the national interest and endangers global order. Formerly unheard-of partners, say the Solomon Islands, now openly turn to join the Axis of Autocracy. This will need more investments in deterrence. Investment isn't an idea confined to personal moneymaking.
The forming bipolarity has greater breadth. Global development continues across both poles and the straddlers and unaligned. Multiple states have nuclear weapons, and more want them. The Alliance for Freedom must increase its security investments, focusing on military realities, soft power and development of democratic potential. More states demand attention. Sadly, this realist logic continues to unfold, multiplying the potential for global conflict.
In all of this, I think it's both sad and important that whatever North Korea pretends to is of less importance than what China does about security relations. This doesn't mean South Korea need not continue to develop her powers and advanced economy as a leader in the Alliance for Freedom ― quite the contrary. The Japan-Russia World War II peace negotiations take a back seat. Hopes for unification and the end of North Korea will too. The real problem is a forming bipolar competition between the Axis of Autocracy and the Alliance for Freedom. It isn't enough to summarize that as China versus the United States anymore.
Bernard Rowan (browan10@yahoo.com) is the associate provost for contract administration and a professor of political science at Chicago State University. He is a past fellow of the Korea Foundation and a former visiting professor at Hanyang University.
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