MACKINDER’S GEO-STRATEGIC NIGHTMARE: The "Great Game" and the Conquest of Eurasia - Towards a World War III Scenario?

MACKINDER’S GEO-STRATEGIC NIGHTMARE: The "Great Game" and the Conquest of Eurasia - Towards a World War III Scenario?

by Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya

Countries and combatant groups which are zigzagging across the international chess board will sooner or later have to position themselves with regard to the big confrontation looming ahead: that which will oppose the United States and China. Two main alliance blocs have already emerged and regardless of the historical bumps along the road (coups, so-called colour revolutions, etc.), the position of all players will inexorably be determined by their strategic interests. The author offers his appraisal of how the two camps will come together during the forthcoming international conflict.

As relics like this Dong Feng 1 missile sit in the Chinese military museum in Beijing, China is increasing its military budget by 17.6 percent, part of a two-decade effort to modernize its forces which may soon unseat the U.S. as hegemon of the Pacific.

“The great wars of history — we have had a world-war about every hundred years for the last four centuries — are the outcome, direct or indirect, of the unequal growth of nations, and that unequal growth is not wholly due to the greater genius and energy of some nations as compared with others; in large measure it is the result of the uneven distribution of fertility and strategical opportunity upon the face of our Globe. In other words, there is in nature no such thing as equality of opportunity for the nations. Unless I wholly misread the facts of geography, I would go further, and say that the grouping of lands and seas, and of fertility and natural pathways, is such as to lead itself to the growth of empires, and in the end of a single World Empire. If we are to realise our ideal of a League of Nations which shall prevent war in the future, we must recognize these geographical realities and take steps to counter their influence.”
Halford J. Mackinder (Democratic Ideals and Reality, 1919)

On September 17, 2009 there were public breaths of relief from citizens across the globe and the people of Eastern Europe as President Barack H. Obama declared that the U.S. missile shield in Poland and the Czech Republic was being put aside. It seemed like the planet was headed towards peace. Conrad Black, in a Canadian editorial, has even gone so far as suggesting creating new spheres of influence in Eurasia with Moscow:

[W]e should then return to a benign version of the time-honoured art of partitioning Eurasia (but not Poland) with Russia. We should collaborate with Russia in suppressing extremism in the former Asian Soviet Republics, including Chechnya, and let them have the two provinces of Georgia they effectively seized in 2008, and the eastern, Russian-speaking half of the Ukraine and Belarus, if that is what those peoples want, and bring the rest definitively into NATO and the EU. [1]

Yet, the missile shield project near the Russian border is not being abandoned.[2] The American military project is being expanded just as it was originally planned in the 1990s. It will involve a naval armada of ships that will surround Eurasia from the Baltic Sea, Black Sea, and the Eastern Mediterranean to the Persian Gulf, South China Sea, and the Yellow Sea.

Land components of the missile shield will also be kept and expanded in the Balkans, Israel, South Korea, and Japan.

The chess pieces for a colossal geo-strategic project are being put into place and coming together. The ultimate goal of this project is the encirclement and control of Eurasia through the jackboots of an ever expanding military machine. While these developments are barely covered by the media, the fate of humanity literally hangs in the balance.

It is because of this project to conquer Eurasia that Russia, China, and Iran have moved closer towards one another and pushed for a united Eurasian front against America and its cohorts. All three Eurasian nations are encircled by a ring of U.S. military bases, military alliances dominated by the U.S. and NATO, and hostile governments supported and armed by both the U.S. government and military.

The war between Georgia and Russia over South Ossetia, the terrorist attacks targeting Iranian border provinces, the tensions between North Korea and South Korea, the revolts in Western China, and the waves of so-called “coloured revolutions” from Lebanon and Moldova to Central Asia and Southeast Asia are an integral part of this geo-political confrontation. The global dimensions of this militarization process are not limited to Eurasia. From Central and South America to Africa, the Arctic Circle, and the Indian Ocean, the main ingredients for World War III are being assembled.

The Struggle between “Eurasianist” and “Westernist” Circles in the Kremlin

The narrative for lordship over Eurasia starts in many different places and times, but for all intents and purposes the halls of political power in post-Soviet Russia, in the Kremlin, after the collapse of the U.S.S.R. and the end of the Cold War have played a crucial role.

Russia from its re-emergence on December 26, 1991 was swamped with uncertainty. Its elites were faced with the question of succumbing even further to the U.S. and E.U. powers and either becoming their junior partner or a dependent state. The newly re-emergent Russia also faced all the conditions of economic and social collapse of the so-called “failed states.”

After the disintegration of the U.S.S.R., Western-oriented or Atlanticist policy and Eurasian-oriented policy were in conflict in Russia and other former Soviet republics as their leaders began to search for their places in the post-Cold War international order.

“Westernist” circles in the post-Soviet space were pushing for a strategic alignment with the West. They favoured a European-oriented policy, including some form of integration with the E.U., as well as a push towards the polity of Europe. On the other hand, “Eurasianist” circles were fostering a strategic cooperation with Asian powers as well as cooperation with Europe. This focus was motivated by the dual European and Asian character of the Russian Federation and post-Soviet space.

The Eurasianists also knew that the next century was to see the rise of China as a global superpower and that the Asia-Pacific region would be the centre of the global economy and international affairs.

Russia faced both Europe and Asia and both the Westernists and the Eurasianists where contending against one another in Russia’s policy circles and in the Kremlin.

With NATO expansion and the realization that the Russian Federation was being targeted by the U.S. the scales began to tilt in favour of the Eurasianists. The Eurasianist view and what would eventually be called the Primakov Doctrine would prevail over the “Europeanist” and “Westernist” policy cliques in Moscow.

The architect of the Primakov Doctrine was Yevgeny Primakov. Primakov was the Russian foreign minister from 1996 to 1998, and later would become the prime minister of Russia in 1998. Primakov put all his efforts into having Russia adopt a strategic policy of global multilateralism and for his idea of formulating a Eurasianist strategy as official Kremlin policy.

Read more here:
[link to twitter.com (secure)]