Antonio Navalón
“There are two infinite things; the Universe and human stupidity, and about the Universe, I am not sure” – Albert Einstein.
When I want to get conspiratorial, I think that the best way out of the moral, economic, military, and social crisis in which the U.S. empire is mired – a category it once held and continues to struggle to preserve – is by betting everything on a war. A war will allow them, as far as possible, to regain their honor, economy, and strategic capacity. After thinking about that, I believe that today’s wars – involving powers that are more or less similar in their destructive ability – are wars that will always end in a draw, for the worse. All this is about our future as human beings and our planet’s permanence, which, although significantly deteriorated, we can still recognize, and who knows if we can even save it. In short, the reality is that there is no chance of a clear winner in a war fought between the U.S., China, and Russia. So what are they playing at?
What is wrong with Nancy Pelosi? What is wrong with the U.S. Democratic Party? What is wrong with President Biden? It isn’t easy to understand that, even though they are two complementary powers and come from the same party, one can start playing with nuclear ballistic missiles without the knowledge of the other. But, worse, imagine what it would have meant if President Biden had forbidden the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives to make her trip and the Speaker – in the name of the youth she no longer has – had decided to disobey and ignore that instruction.
By all accounts, Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan was a blunder. If it was an operation to test the vitality and vigor of the tiger, the act went severely wrong. The tiger, rightly or wrongly, believes himself to be in full strength and fortitude and is willing to die in defense of what he believes and what, above all, he wants the rest of us to believe. With a war in dispute like the one in Ukraine; with a Europe bleeding and disheartened; and with a China that, for the first time in a long time, shows signs of weakness and economic crisis, imagine all that this act could have unleashed. Especially if one considers the mentality that – as the United States has always thought – wars are a way to solve economic crises, even though history has shown that the cure was always worse than the disease. This is taking place amid a situation in which, with each passing day, those of us who are part of the so-called democratic Western bloc of development are becoming more and more isolated from the other realities of the world. Realities that are numerically, strategically – and from wherever one looks – every day superior to the West.
Up to this point, the group of those who have come to China’s immediate aid and offered their help as far as possible – or, as we say in Mexico, “as far as it will go” – is made up of Russia and Iran. Anyone who knows history will know that India cannot do so because of its permanent territorial dispute with China. But that does not mean that in a kind of association similar to that of the BRICS, two clear blocks in the world will not end up being organized, which, in addition to playing with missiles and nuclear holocaust, can create an alternative economy and economic reality in which we have everything to lose.
You should always be ready to shoot when you pull out a gun. Otherwise, it is better not to carry one and avoid having to eat it in soup form. At this point, aside from the evidence of the already complete destruction and division of the Democratic Party and American institutions, what does Pelosi’s Taiwan adventure really mean? What was it done for? What was sought or pursued?
The Americans managed to escape Vietnam and were able to escape the failure of Southeast Asia for the West for one elementary reason. The ignorant strategists of the State Department, the builders of the domino theory during Eisenhower’s presidency, found out too late that the rupture between Mao and Stalin – that is, between the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and its Chinese counterpart – was accurate and forceful. And that under no circumstances would the victory in Vietnam of the Chinese mean an increase in the political strength of the International Communist Party or the Kremlin. That motivated Kissinger’s visit to China and his pact with Mao to reestablish relations that best represented the global panorama and marked the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st century.
Henry Kissinger argued that it took forty years for the United States he advised and inspired to separate China and Russia. In contrast, it took Donald Trump two years to bring them back together. Today China and Russia share common positions – albeit with significant differences since China is not adventurous or warlike as Russia is. It should not be forgotten that the great Chinese symbol is the Great Wall, which symbolizes that the Asian country has ceased to have an invasive posture and aspirations and has instead adopted a defensive position for centuries.
Since the last moments of Donald Trump’s administration, a curious alliance has been slowly but steadily forged. The rupture and fragmentation caused by the previous occupant of the White House with the Chinese have mainly been why both Putin and Xi Jinping have forged closer ties. Just as Trump has always been and will always remain Vladimir Putin’s dear friend, it should not be forgotten that it was also the former U.S. president who declared the tariff war against China, putting an end to the idyllic era in which the Chinese could take everything and the West could be happy and satisfied with everything it sold to China.
Are we on the verge of a Third World War? I believe that the first of the global battles, the economic one, is already being unleashed. Because, and regardless of whether or not missiles are fired, it is impossible to go back to the times of the Bretton Woods Agreements or to the times when everything was governed by the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. This is another era. Despite the strong position of the dollar, the dominant economic players in this era are no longer the United States or the European Union. Their long string of failures prevents us from thinking that we will see a strong and consolidated European Union in the coming years.
With this new economic structure, does it mean that the BRICS countries are the ones who will be quoting and dictating the economic rules? I don’t know. But what I know is that at this moment, the union of interests between the European energy dependence on Russia, coupled with the great Chinese economic power in the form of strong investments in both the United States and Europe, can produce a very unfavorable situation for the West. All this leads us to a scenario in which, first of all, there is an economic and social risk within a kind of crisis and massive elimination of the democratic concept in the main developed and developing societies. But, in addition, this panorama places countries like Mexico in a situation that can be exceptionally favorable if the first deceptive impulse of having a real alternative that adds to our economic development from outside the USMCA is followed. Seeking to become a functional economy by strengthening ties with countries on the other side of the Pacific Ocean and with blocs such as ASEAN.
As you can see, this is not the best time for gerontocracy to rule the world. Nor is it the best time to go around doing experiments with nitroglycerin thinking it is mineral water, like what Pelosi’s trip to Taiwan meant. From here on, one of the big questions is: when, where, and how will the war in Ukraine end? A situation that amazes me more and more every day because nobody is talking about the end of this conflict, and the only thing that will happen is that no Ukrainian will be left alive at the end of the war. And the fact is that, with the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives landing in Taipei, the only thing that is clear is that the Taiwanese – like the Ukrainians – are at serious risk of disappearing. In the face of all this, the only thing that is clear is that we learn nothing from the past and that human stupidity is the only thing that is constantly increasing. I hope I am wrong, and that reason will prevail for the first time.
This column bids farewell for the remainder of August. We will be back on the first Sunday of September, although nobody knows in what conditions or the world we will be in by then. Good summer!
