Antonio Navalón
No war is like any other. If one looks at the prelude to the war of 1914 or 1939, one will realize that in both cases, one of the only constants was the denial or omission of reality by the countries that ended up being the leading players. Why does a world war start? What makes a conflict become of medium or high intensity? What elements cause more countries to get involved in addition to the initial ones and turn into a conflict that puts the world’s order, structure, and configuration at risk? As I said earlier, the elements and motives change with each war that breaks out.
At present, two conflicts are leading the world towards a new partitioning of the real axes of power among several players. On the one hand, the conflict between Russia and Ukraine is unclear when and how it will end, although it seems the end is near. And, on the other – and more latent – is the much-talked-about conflict between Israel and Hamas. These conflicts, among other factors and motives, show that the world ceased to be bipolar years ago. Today, the world is multipolar and has an assortment of players capable – due to their economic, political, and military qualities – of either building or destroying the planet. However, the United States continues to play a leading role, if not the protagonist, then the most decisive one. Despite everything, it is still the leader, from the military to the economic sphere. Close behind is one of the beneficiaries of Chinese expansionism and the second biggest winner of the Second World War, the former Soviet Union, now Russia. Following these players is what is now the most populous country on Earth, India. And in a place that is still unclear whether it is more decisive than the others, we find the great geostrategic player of the last decades, China.
The world is still a living witness to the consequences and the legacy of the world forged since the end of the two world wars. Of this legacy, the most important factor is – in my opinion – the separation between the West and the East. This separation was forged and nested a latent threat that no one could understand well. A threat that is capable of being comprehended under a phrase supposedly said by Napoleon Bonaparte that dictates: “Let China sleep, because when she wakes up, the world will tremble” or under what Alain Peyrefitte wrote in his book “When China wakes up…the world will tremble”. Today’s question is about what the world would be like with China acting and living based on its capabilities. Nobody saw either the recovery or the presence or the dimension of the growth that China has been experiencing in recent years. Beyond the fact that it is supposed to be a developed country built by the communists, at its core, the Chinese miracle is based on constructing an economic development, taking advantage of the vast trap and overconfidence that the West and most countries fell into. While many parts of the world, including mainly the United States, were paying the Chinese to do what they were unwilling to do, China was – little by little and on the sly – consolidating itself as a great world power.
In addition to the separation between East and West, another of the most important factors was the example and the legacy we received since 1917, such as the Balfour Declaration and the unification, in a certain sense, of the Arab world as crucial elements of the division of powers in the world. The war that is latent today and the most critical danger that the planet has in its confrontations is not due to ideological or social issues, but it is due to the dimension that the religious war between the Arab world and the Western world has acquired.
What is currently happening in the West Bank and southern Israel is the continuity of the world designed by England since 1905, based on controlling or interfering in the countries that possess oil. From the Balfour map was born – with the help of the Nazis – the State of Israel. But, much more important than that was the emergence of the economic layout that would allow England to have the military, financial, and structural hegemony of the world where oil was produced.
“Lawrence of Arabia”, besides being a magnificent film directed by David Lean, is also a testimony of how the very complicated, intelligent, and sensitive Lieutenant Thomas Edward Lawrence was. A character who was commissioned by the English empire to point out and walk the path of tribal clashes in the Arabian Peninsula until it gave birth to what today is – together with Venezuela – the world’s largest oil reserve: Saudi Arabia. Naturally, from the time of Saladin to the present day, the Arab world – like the entire heritage of the countries created under the shadow of Abraham – has an indispensable element of Cainism in history. In that sense, the Sunni Arabs are in a deadly contest with the Arab branch founded by the son-in-law of the Prophet Mohammed and known today as the Shiites. The latter group, which is a minority in the Arab world, is characterized by the discipline and mysticism that surrounds the countries in which they are installed. The Shiites have become the support of what was the Persian Empire, today being the Republic they built under Ruhollah Khomeini. They are the best and most complete organization and military example of the mixture between the terrorist groups and the regular armies of some countries.
The Shiites are the mainstay of the most significant open wound that Israel has in the northern part of its territory since – depending on the orders received by Tehran – Hezbollah could join the conflict against the Israelis, forcing them to fight on two fronts. At this point, I am convinced that Hamas’ entry into the West Bank could only be perpetrated under whether Israel could sustain a war against them and, simultaneously, a confrontation with Hezbollah on its northern border. Naturally, that answers the big question of how far the conflict will go, and – as is said both in Washington and Tel Aviv – it will be until they manage to cut off the head of the snake’s nest. But that brings up a problem that is the constant of major military moves since the end of World War II.
General George Patton, the one-time military commander of the U.S. Zone of Occupation in Germany who staged some of the most critical scenes of seizure and recapture against the Nazi army, never understood, first, why Franklin Delano Roosevelt had made an agreement with Stalin to allow his tanks and soldiers to enter Berlin and try to take the Führer alive. But more than that, General Patton also did not understand the refusal on the part of President Truman when he asked permission to take his army into Moscow. For him, the invasion would culminate what he saw as the major post-war problem: coexistence with the Communists.
The world geopolitical balance demands moderation and no absolute victors. In that sense, the Americans and the Soviets did defeat the Nazis. However, following a destructive path was impossible until a final victory was proclaimed. General Patton died in Heidelberg – German territory then occupied by the Allies – in a suspicious traffic accident before returning to the United States to report to his bosses. This meant undermining attempts to end what would later become the Iron Curtain and would mean 54 years of tension between East and West during the Cold War.
A similar case occurred after the failure of the Korean War between 1950 and 1953, when General Douglas MacArthur – another American military legend of World War II – after realizing China’s ambition and growth, was denied his proposal to launch an attack against Beijing. MacArthur did not die in a car accident like Patton but was removed from his post by Truman, ending his military career. MacArthur’s mistake was to have had the certainty – which today can be clearly seen – that, sooner rather than later, China would be a problem for the West.
Today, the summary is clear: Can Tehran be reached? Is it possible to reach Iran’s capital without the intervention of countries such as Russia? Honestly, what are the Chinese playing at on the map of the Middle East conflict? And, more importantly, is there a possibility of a winner in the Arab world? In this regard, it is necessary to add that the strength of Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s emergence in the line of succession in Saudi Arabia gives a unique opportunity to all Arabs and Muslims who are not Shiites to win the territorial balance. This would trigger a shift from the Tehran-Lebanon axis to the Saudi Arabia-Israel axis.
As can be seen, the world situation is very complicated, and there are many reasons to suppose that anything can happen. In any case, what must be known is that right now – as has happened before – it is a game of balance. That is why Secretary Blinken has spent a week going from country to country trying to control the effect of the explosion, at the same time that more than 14,000 American soldiers are already on the battle scene in the confrontation between Israel against, on the one hand, the Hamas terrorists and, on the other hand, against the challenge posed by Hezbollah from Lebanon.
It seems clear that after all that has happened in recent years with the Arab world, this time, the United States has decided not to wait for everything to explode and to play to win. The Americans have moved their two largest and most important Carriers into the conflict theater area. Add to that the fact that Israel possesses one-third of the total air force in the region, and the result is an air superiority of such a level that it could be the most important deployment of air elements since the Normandy Landings.
It is impossible to have an estimate or approximation of what the next few years will be like, but it is also impossible to live with the oppressive belt that means the Arab world and its European dominance. Europe is strangled by the social and physical capacity of all the misfits of another religion and another God. It is difficult to accept that the European demographic majority has been replaced by immigrants who add to the life of the country they arrive in with no other interest than to continue exploiting its resources. Europe is under siege by a social majority from the suburbs that neither feels European nor values Europe, its history, culture, and values and does not intend to respect or defend the majority status, hegemony, and control of European societies. Tel Aviv and Washington know all this much better. It is a game in which the real riddle is how to reinstall order without unleashing Armageddon.
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