1er<\/sup>juin 2018 – Il y a une d\u00e9cade (le 20 mai 2018<\/a> sur son blog <\/em>dit La Parole Franche<\/em>, ou usforeignpolicy.blogs.lalibre.be<\/em>), l’excellent commentateur et historien Gilbert Doctorow a consacr\u00e9 un essai \u00e0 deux hommes qu’il d\u00e9signe comme les deux \u00ab\u00a0pacificateurs\u00a0\u00bb, ou \u00ab\u00a0faiseurs de paix\u00a0\u00bb (peacemakers<\/em>) de l’\u00e9poque, – que l’on pourrait d’ailleurs d\u00e9signer plut\u00f4t comme des \u00ab\u00a0mainteneurs de paix\u00a0\u00bb, vaille que vaille : Donald Trump et Vladimir Poutine.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Certains pourraient dire qu’on s’en doutait depuis 2016 où Trump semblait nous promettre de bien meilleures relations des USA avec la Russie, et donc une d\u00e9marche commune de paix ; sauf que, bien sûr, cette \u00ab\u00a0promesse\u00a0\u00bb du candidat r\u00e9publicain et surprise ne s’est jamais concr\u00e9tis\u00e9e et que les relations entre les USA et la Russie sont pires que sous la pr\u00e9sidence Obama<\/strong>. Les relations personnelles entre Poutine et Trump sont rest\u00e9es \u00e9pisodiques, incertaines sinon inexistantes. Il n’y a entre eux aucune entente particuli\u00e8re, aucune complicit\u00e9 ni quoi que ce soit de cette sorte <\/strong>quand on les compare \u00e0 tant d’autres \u00ab\u00a0couples\u00a0\u00bb de dirigeants politiques, et leurs br\u00e8ves rencontres ici et l\u00e0 n’ont d\u00e9bouch\u00e9 sur rien de commun qui fût assez constructif pour qu’on pût parler d’une v\u00e9ritable \u00ab\u00a0paix\u00a0\u00bb qui serait n\u00e9e d’une \u00e9ventuelle proximit\u00e9. Ceux qui attendent quelque chose de cette sorte seront, de l’avis de Doctorow, bien d\u00e9\u00e7us<\/strong> ; il le dit clairement dans sa conclusion…<\/p>\n<\/p>\n « C’est une caract\u00e9ristique curieuse de nos temps confus et contradictoires, que certains de mes pairs gardent l’espoir qu’une r\u00e9union au sommet de Poutine et Trump pourrait fournir une perc\u00e9e dans les relations qui mettraient fin \u00e0 l’impasse mondiale et ouvriraient une \u00e8re de paix. Ils vont m\u00eame jusqu’\u00e0 esp\u00e9rer un partenariat strat\u00e9gique am\u00e9ricano-russe<\/em>.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n » De ce qui pr\u00e9c\u00e8de, il devrait \u00eatre \u00e9vident que tout rapprochement possible entre les États-Unis et la F\u00e9d\u00e9ration de Russie n’est qu’un vague espoir pour un avenir lointain et d\u00e9pend compl\u00e8tement d’un changement fondamental dans la conception de l’establishment US, passant de sa certitude que l’h\u00e9g\u00e9monie mondiale lui revient \u00ab\u00a0de naissance\u00a0\u00bb et \u00ab\u00a0de droit\u00a0\u00bb \u00e0 la fois \u00e0 la volont\u00e9 d’occuper une position au milieu de ses pairs, pour rechercher une paix par consensus, et nullement par diktat. Ce jour n’est pas pour bient\u00f4t<\/em>. »<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Ce pessimisme couronne ainsi tr\u00e8s curieusement une analyse assez optimiste sur le maintien d’une certaine situation de paix (pour ce qui concerne le risque de grande guerre conventionnelle\/nucl\u00e9aire) entre les deux puissances nucl\u00e9aires, on dirait par logique contradictoire<\/strong>, selon une analyse et un cheminement de pens\u00e9e qui nous convient parfaitement. Ce cheminement passe par deux portraits psychologiques des deux pr\u00e9sidents concern\u00e9s, Trump et Poutine successivement, qui rencontrent \u00e9galement notre perception : deux pr\u00e9sidents qui, contrairement \u00e0 ce qu’on avait pu croire en 2016, ne sont pas faits pour s’entendre mais au contraire pour ne pas se comprendre<\/strong> : cela signifiant qu’ils ne s’entendront pas, moins par d\u00e9saccord que par diff\u00e9rence compl\u00e8te de fa\u00e7on de penser et d’agir. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n Ce d\u00e9calage de perception s’explique par le fait qu’en 2016, nous \u00e9tions dans une situation tactique, voire d\u00e9magogique<\/strong>(essentiellement sinon exclusivement du point de vue de Trump qui se battait pour l’\u00e9lection) alors qu’aujourd’hui nous sommes dans une situation strat\u00e9gique<\/strong>. Poutine est toujours rest\u00e9 dans une posture strat\u00e9gique, d’abord pour observer qui \u00e9tait Trump et comment il \u00e9voluait (avec un espoir temporaire d’une entente strat\u00e9gique), puis sans doute et sans trop de d\u00e9sespoir pour constater l’impossibilit\u00e9 d’une entente strat\u00e9gique.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n (Il faut noter que Doctorow n’accorde que peu de place aux influences ext\u00e9rieures, notamment le fameux DeepState<\/em>et le reste du c\u00f4t\u00e9 de Trump. Il ne pense certainement pas qu’il n’y a pas de jeu d’influence, de pressions diverses, etc., du c\u00f4t\u00e9 de Trump, mais il semble bien ne pas croire que l’attitude fondamentale de Trump soit forc\u00e9e par ces influences.)<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Le portait que Doctorow fait de Poutine est net et droit. Ce \u00ab\u00a0mainteneur de paix\u00a0\u00bb ne veut pas la guerre, ni des enchaînements menant \u00e0 la guerre<\/strong>, — on parle ici d’un affrontement au plus haut niveau, – et pour cela il n’a de cesse d’assurer et de renforcer la posture militaire de la Russie, comme l’ont montr\u00e9 son discours du 1er<\/sup>mars et les r\u00e9v\u00e9lations sur les nouveaux armements strat\u00e9giques russes qui produisent d\u00e9sormais un effet consid\u00e9rable m\u00eame si les \u00ab\u00a0gens s\u00e9rieux\u00a0\u00bb du domaine (le Pentagone) ne s’\u00e9panchent pas trop \u00e0 cet \u00e9gard.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Il est clair qu’avec les efforts de modernisation de l’outil militaire russe, Poutine a quasiment renvers\u00e9 la position d’inf\u00e9riorit\u00e9 strat\u00e9gique nucl\u00e9aire de la Russie de 2007-2008<\/strong> ; il se garde bien, lui Poutine, de parler de \u00ab\u00a0sup\u00e9riorit\u00e9 strat\u00e9gique\u00a0\u00bb et il lui pr\u00e9f\u00e8re la notion de \u00ab\u00a0r\u00e9tablissement de la parit\u00e9 strat\u00e9gique\u00a0\u00bb. En v\u00e9rit\u00e9, il ne fait aucun doute \u00e0 nos yeux que dans cette situation où les normes, la coop\u00e9ration et les ententes sont remplac\u00e9es par la concurrence, il y a renversement<\/a> (l’\u00e9l\u00e9ment chinois s’inscrivant en plus mais n’\u00e9tant pas n\u00e9cessaire \u00e0 la position nouvelle de la Russie) :<\/p>\n<\/p>\n « C’est une situation assez \u00e9tonnante que la lenteur du syst\u00e8me de la communication am\u00e9ricaniste dans ce d\u00e9bat qui implique, non pas un \u00ab\u00a0r\u00e9tablissement de la parit\u00e9 strat\u00e9gique\u00a0\u00bb avec les USA comme le disent poliment Russes et Chinois, mais un renversement radical de la sup\u00e9riorit\u00e9 strat\u00e9gique dans les domaines conventionnel et nucl\u00e9aire, en faveur de la Russie et de la Chine<\/strong><\/em>. »<\/p>\n<\/p>\n … Pour autant, r\u00e9p\u00e9tons-le, Poutine est bien un \u00ab\u00a0faiseur\/mainteneur de paix\u00a0\u00bb<\/strong>. Le plus simplement du monde pour un strat\u00e8ge, – et la grande strat\u00e9gie est celle qui se nourrit de simplicit\u00e9, – il n’a fait qu’appliquer la maxime archi-connue du \u00ab\u00a0Si vis pacem, para bellum<\/em>\u00ab\u00a0<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n Trump, lui, est \u00ab\u00a0mainteneur de paix\u00a0\u00bb par inadvertance, et m\u00eame par contradiction. Le portrait qu’en fait Doctorow est certainement celui que nous affectionnons nous-m\u00eames : le cr\u00e9ateur<\/a> de d\u00e9sordre<\/a> au cœur de la puissance US par affirmation brutale de cette puissance sans prendre la moindre pr\u00e9caution vis-\u00e0-vis des composants de cette puissance, et encore moins de ceux qui subissent les effets de cette brutalit\u00e9<\/strong>. Doctorow ne pense pas que Trump avait comme ambition sp\u00e9cifique et strat\u00e9gique de se rapprocher de la Russie lorsqu’il exposait ce programme au long des \u00e9lections de 2016, mais plut\u00f4t de r\u00e9aliser un rapprochement tactique pour stopper sinon contrecarrer le rapprochement entre la Russie et la Chine. Doctorow estime que l’influence du vieil Henry Kissinger a \u00e9t\u00e9 fondamentale sur ce point, et c’est effectivement pour accroître d\u00e9cisivement l’opposition entre la Chine et la Russie (alors URSS) que Kissinger justifie le rapprochement d\u00e9cisif des USA avec la Chine, avec la visite de Nixon \u00e0 P\u00e9kin en 1971 que le m\u00eame Kissinger organisa dans le plus grand secret qui \u00e9tait l’une de ses pratiques favorites.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n (Il n’est pas assur\u00e9 du tout que cette conception de Kissinger ait \u00e9t\u00e9 celle de Nixon, comme il est loin d’\u00eatre acquis que l’id\u00e9e d’un rapprochement des USA de la Chine soit de Kissinger et non de Nixon <\/strong>comme le premier l’a souvent laiss\u00e9 entendre. Nixon avait largement d\u00e9velopp\u00e9 cette id\u00e9e avant de devenir pr\u00e9sident, et il l’avait d\u00e9velopp\u00e9e selon une logique emprunt\u00e9e au g\u00e9n\u00e9ral de Gaulle, qu’il admirait profond\u00e9ment, qui repose sur le simple constat de la l\u00e9gitimit\u00e9 et de la souverainet\u00e9, de l’impossibilit\u00e9 de ne pas reconnaître l’existence d’une entit\u00e9 de cette taille et de ce poids historique pour mieux organiser les relations internationales en lui donnant la place qui lui revenait. Pour Nixon, qui pensait en termes de diplomate soucieux de rechercher des \u00e9quilibres<\/strong>, il s’agissait de renforcer l’\u00e9quilibre des puissances en reconnaissant celle de la Chine et en l’int\u00e9grant dans un grand syst\u00e8me de compromis que certains ont nomm\u00e9 \u00ab\u00a0d\u00e9tente\u00a0\u00bb.)<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Toit cela nous vaut une explication de Doctorow concernant Trump, où le facteur psychologique tient une importance consid\u00e9rable : « P<\/em>ourquoi alors cat\u00e9goriser Trump en tant que pacificateur? Cela vient du faut de son action de destruction perverse et par ignorance de l’h\u00e9g\u00e9monie mondiale am\u00e9ricaine par son abandon de ce qu’on nomme le \u00ab\u00a0soft power\u00a0\u00bb, notamment avec l’usage tactique des \u00ab\u00a0valeurs partag\u00e9es\u00a0\u00bb, pour s’appuyer enti\u00e8rement sur la force, sur le chantage ouvert pour \u00ab\u00a0n\u00e9gocier\/imposer des accords\u00a0\u00bb avec les alli\u00e9s am\u00e9ricains en Europe et en Asie. Cela vient directement de la personnalit\u00e9 du Pr\u00e9sident, de son ADN, de son exp\u00e9rience avec ses anciens partenaires d’affaires où l’on cherche une \u00ab\u00a0position de force\u00a0\u00bb pour imposer ses conditions plut\u00f4t que de rechercher des compromis <\/strong>pour des solutions où les deux n\u00e9gociateurs emportent quelque choses (situations dites \u00ab\u00a0gagnant-gagnant\u00a0\u00bb).<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n » La vulgarit\u00e9 grossi\u00e8re de Trump, sa tendance \u00e0 trahir sa parole, sa volont\u00e9 d’humilier publiquement ses interlocuteurs compl\u00e8tent sa fa\u00e7on d’agir qu’on retrouve dans des affaires, comme les divers retraits d’accords existants, de l’accord nucl\u00e9aire iranien, de l’accord sur le changement climatique, sur le Partenariat transpacifique, sur le Partenariat transatlantique de commerce et d’investissement et sur ALENA.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n » L’establishment washingtonien comprenait bien que Trump \u00e9tait un d\u00e9sastre pour l’\u00e9difice d’un ordre mondial r\u00e9gi par des r\u00e8gles qu’il avait si m\u00e9ticuleusement cultiv\u00e9 ces derni\u00e8res d\u00e9cennies et qui ont pay\u00e9 de beaux dividendes financiers aux classes dirigeantes am\u00e9ricaines, qui ont festoy\u00e9 aux frais du reste du monde. Mais il \u00e9tait et reste incommode d’expliquer pr\u00e9cis\u00e9ment ce qui n’allait pas avec lui <\/em>[Trump]. Il y a ici et l\u00e0 des balivernes \u00e0 ce propos, comme cette observation d’un commentateur-Syst\u00e8me comme Roger Cohen, dans son dernier feuilleton du New York Times où il nous parle d’une \u00ab\u00a0pourriture morale qui menace l’Am\u00e9rique\u00a0\u00bb \u00e9manant du Bureau ovale.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n » La pens\u00e9e dominante parmi les analystes politiques des m\u00e9dias alternatifs – que ce soit TheDuran, Consortium News ou Peter Lavelle de Russie Today sur Cross Talk – est que cet odieux pr\u00e9sident am\u00e9ricain fera son chemin et que l’emprise am\u00e9ricaine sur le monde continuera malgr\u00e9 ses exc\u00e8s. Ils nous disent que l’Europe va \u00ab\u00a0caner\u00a0\u00bb devant Trump \u00e0 propos de l’Iran et finalement imposer les sanctions que demande Washington. On fait valoir que les dirigeants europ\u00e9ens peuvent certes parler haut et dur mais que la r\u00e9alit\u00e9 des affaires est telle que les bons rapports avec Washington sont trop pr\u00e9cieux compte tenu de la divergence dans les volumes de commerce avec les États-Unis par opposition \u00e0 l’Iran.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n » Cependant, ces analystes n\u00e9gligent non seulement les effets possibles de l’humiliation totalement ind\u00e9cente de Trump envers les dirigeants amis, mais aussi la question de la s\u00e9curit\u00e9 nationale existentielle, qui, partout et \u00e0 tout moment, l’emporte sur l’avantage commercial pour d\u00e9terminer les relations inter\u00e9tatiques. Le simple fait est que l’Europe a horreur de l’id\u00e9e d’un Iran nucl\u00e9aire que le trait\u00e9 actuel emp\u00eache efficacement, ou plus g\u00e9n\u00e9ralement d’un Moyen-Orient \u00e9quip\u00e9 d’armes nucl\u00e9aires qui peuvent menacer l’Europe. Ainsi l’Europe s’oppose-t-elle fermement \u00e0 un risque catastrophique dans ce domaine, comme la r\u00e9vocation du pacte nucl\u00e9aire par Trump avec les Iraniens<\/strong>. Ce sont des pr\u00e9occupations qui rendent impossible une \u00ab\u00a0capitulation\u00a0\u00bb <\/em>[des Europ\u00e9ens], quelle que soit la pi\u00e8tre mesure du courage personnel des dirigeants europ\u00e9ens.<\/em> »<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Ainsi nous explique Doctorow, Trump, par ses habitudes comportementales de businessman<\/em>de choc, \u00ab\u00a0\u00e0 l’am\u00e9ricaine\u00a0\u00bb, pousse le syst\u00e8me de l’am\u00e9ricanisme (de l’h\u00e9g\u00e9monisme am\u00e9ricaniste) \u00e0 son extr\u00eame. Il fait fonctionner \u00e0 fond l’\u00e9quation surpuissance-autodestruction<\/strong>, notamment parce qu’il utilise un instrument dont l’efficacit\u00e9 est \u00e0 son extr\u00eame limite (la puissance am\u00e9ricaniste sur-\u00e9tendue) et qu’il se heurte alors aux \u00ab\u00a0gardiens du temple\u00a0\u00bb qui savent parfaitement ce qu’ils risquent et qui disposent \u00e0 Washington d’une puissance d’influence \u00e9norme (« Les derniers, et peut-\u00eatre les seuls vrais r\u00e9alistes dans l’establishment du pouvoir am\u00e9ricain, le commandement militaire du Pentagone, ont pris une claire mesure de la puissance et de la d\u00e9termination de la Russie.<\/em> »)<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Le r\u00e9sultat n’en reste pas moins que la pouss\u00e9e de Trump met en \u00e9vidence les limites de la puissance US <\/strong>et d\u00e9truit l’\u00e9norme influence h\u00e9g\u00e9monique ce pays-continent exer\u00e7ait sur le reste du monde, de ce fait mettant sa puissance militaire sur la d\u00e9fensive, sinon sur la voie de la retraite presqu’en d\u00e9route<\/strong>… Et le r\u00e9sultat final, paradoxal, \u00e9tant effectivement qu’en agissant de la sorte Trump \u00e9loigne les risques de guerre que la puissance militaire US aurait \u00e9t\u00e9 plus tent\u00e9s de courir si elle avait dispos\u00e9 du champ et de la m\u00e9thode pour pouvoir mieux utiliser ses moyens, – et par cons\u00e9quent, oui, Trump \u00ab\u00a0faiseur\/mainteneur de paix\u00a0\u00bb<\/strong>sans le savoir et m\u00eame, pourrait-on dire, en s’en fichant bien<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n « En surjouant sa main, Donald Trump acc\u00e9l\u00e8re l’effondrement de l’h\u00e9g\u00e9monie mondiale des États-Unis et du triomphalisme qui a guid\u00e9 le comportement belliqueux qui risquait de d\u00e9clencher la guerre par calcul ou erreur de calcul. De cette fa\u00e7on, Trump a involontairement encourag\u00e9 la paix mondiale.<\/em> »<\/p>\n<\/p>\n La d\u00e9monstration th\u00e9orique est tout \u00e0 fait satisfaisante pour l’esprit, combinant d’une fa\u00e7on tr\u00e8s originale deux caract\u00e8res et deux comportements si \u00e9trangers, pour aboutir \u00e0 ce paradoxe : nous qui attendions tant de la rencontre Poutine-Trump pour nous \u00e9viter un conflit, c’est l’impossibilit\u00e9 de cette rencontre qui, par annihilation r\u00e9ciproque, nous \u00e9viterait ce conflit<\/strong>. (Lorsque nous parlons d'\u00a0\u00bbimpossibilit\u00e9 de rencontre\u00a0\u00bb Poutine-Trump selon Doctorow, nous voulons parler bien entendu et d’abord d’une \u00ab\u00a0rencontre d’esprit\u00a0\u00bb mais \u00e9galement de rencontres tout court parce qu’inutiles, comme si Poutine et Trump vivaient dans des mondes parall\u00e8les qui, par d\u00e9finition euclidienne, ne se rencontrent jamais<\/strong>…) Bien entendu, il s’agit de deux personnes, de deux dirigeants, et la concentration de l’observation sur eux deux ne r\u00e9sout pas le probl\u00e8me, ni des relations entre la Russie et les USA, ni encore moins du Syst\u00e8me lui-m\u00eame.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n A cet \u00e9gard, Doctorow reste assez vague et ne nous convainc certainement pas lorsqu’il conclut : « Ceci <\/em>[l’absence de communication au niveau des deux dirigeants US et russe] passera. Peut-\u00eatre le r\u00e9sultat de l’\u00e9lection de 2020 ouvrira-t-il de nouvelles perspectives<\/em>. » Pour ne pas \u00eatre abrupt, nous dirons que \u00ab\u00a0sans doute les r\u00e9sultats de l’\u00e9lection 2020 n’ouvriront-ils aucune nouvelle perspective\u00a0\u00bb, et c’est sans aucun doute en cela que notre point de vue diff\u00e8re de celui de Doctorow.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Quoi qu’il en soit, l’essai de Gilbert Doctorow, – c’est en effet plus un essai qu’un article, – m\u00e9rite sans aucun doute la lecture. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n _________________________<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Though I have been practicing the art of political science these past ten years as essayist and journalist, my professional training as an historian comes to the fore occasionally as I ponder chains of causality and in particular, the fine interrelationship of deep-lying social-economic-geopolitical currents that carry us along and the determining forces of powerful individuals on the surface of the ocean of time.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Events of the past several weeks if not months going back to 1 March put these issues into high relief. By largely unforeseeable and counter-intuitive developments, the world is a much safer place than it was before 1 March 2018, and none of this is thanks to the efforts of me, my colleagues in the alternative news or of you, the reader. To our shame, we, the People have been silent witnesses of the daily news, often left scratching our heads at the way history is lurching forward before our eyes.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n I involuntarily think back to the standards of thirty or forty years ago, when less threatening demarches and counter-demarches of the leading actors in the Cold War than those of today brought tens of thousands of demonstrators out onto the streets in Europe and in North America. I have in mind the Soviet deployment of SS-20 intermediate range missiles and the counter-deployment of US nuclear armed cruise missiles in Germany. Civil society then protested loudly at the seeming march towards the abyss of mutual annihilation by sleep-walking heads of state. By contrast, the near catastrophic weekend of 14 April 2018 when Donald Trump sent 103 cruise missiles crashing into Syrian targets amidst dire Russian warnings against crossing their red lines in the country came and went with civil society on both sides of the Atlantic at the edge of their seats, but still sitting in comfortable armchairs, not out and about venting its opposition to approaching Armageddon.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n So much for \u00ab\u00a0progressive humanity,\u00a0\u00bb not to mention specifically women or minorities whom our present-day historians like to think are shaping the course of destiny while they play down the role of \u00ab\u00a0great men.\u00a0\u00bb Indeed, we are being led precisely by our heads of state and, to name names, by two men of destiny, Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin. In this essay I argue that whether by volition or by circumstance, they have both turned out to be the peacemakers we need to survive the present bumpy road of transitioning the world order from the failed US global hegemony or unipolar configuration to the coming but still not arrived multipolar configuration. In time present, we are neither here nor there but in a special, if ephemeral bipolar world of US-Russian confrontation that has turned quite ugly and dangerous.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n ***<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Given the latest exchange of barbs between Donald Trump and the North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, their summit planned for Singapore in early June may never take place. However that may be, the very thought of its happening, explained by some in the West as resulting from the tough sanctions regime, still tougher talk of Donald Trump from late autumn into the early spring of this year appeared to justify nominating the American President for a Nobel Peace Prize. To be sure, this hypothetical nomination has more justice to it than the actual award of a Nobel to Barack Obama in 2009 for his not being George W. Bush. In both cases, the award was\/would be prescriptive rather than actually earned.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n At the same time, the notion of Trump as peacemaker can be traced back to his speeches during the 2016 electoral campaign when he repeatedly said that he would seek normal relations with Russia while berating those who insisted on Cold War rhetoric. That was politically courageous in the context of overheated Russophobia within the US political establishment representing both parties. Since it added nothing to the candidate’s popularity while presenting a red flag to his critics, the policy had all appearances of deep conviction in pursuit of peace. It was on the basis of this issue alone that I and several acquaintances cast our vote for candidate Trump.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Of course, once in office Trump’s policy on Russia took a markedly different turn, and in recent months he has boasted that his administration is much tougher on Russia than Barack Obama had been. The generally accepted explanation for this has been the mad pursuit of a \u00ab\u00a0Russian connection,\u00a0\u00bb of \u00ab\u00a0complicity\u00a0\u00bb between Trump’s campaign and the Kremlin that allegedly threw the election his way. This is the line of attack on Trump led by the Clinton faction of the Democratic Party, and it finds support from some Republicans as well. Their common objective is to turn Trump out of office by impeachment. The consequence, it is believed, was that Trump has been forced to abandon his pursuit of accommodation with the Kremlin and to align himself with those who describe Russia as the greatest threat to American security.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n However, this explanation may be too facile and misses an important strategic consideration that probably underpinned Trump’s pro-Russian stance during the campaign: namely, that at the time Henry Kissinger was de facto one of his key policy advisers, and Henry clearly urged a re-set with the Kremlin in order to undo the forming Russia-China axis facilitated by Obama’s misguided policies of simultaneous containment of America’s two global rivals that spelled the undoing of his own lifetime achievement from the time of Nixon’s d\u00e9tente. A rapprochement with Russia, Henry advised, would make it possible for the US to deal firmly and decisively with the perceived greater strategic threat to American worldwide hegemony that China represented<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Very early in the new administration, Vladimir Putin made it clear that no \u00ab\u00a0come hither\u00a0\u00bb look from Washington could prompt a strategic re-alignment against China. This was a scenario imaginable only to someone lacking a firm grasp of Putin’s thinking and behavior, of his loyalty to friends and disdain for treachery. But then again, Henry Kissinger was never very interested in Russia, never studied the country with any seriousness and enjoyed an undeserved reputation as expert in this domain.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Accordingly, with no benefits to realize by pursuing accommodation with Russia and a lot of political grief to pay domestically for doing so, Donald Trump changed his stripes on Russia in spring 2017 and went with the flow, went even beyond Obama in his truculent punishment of the Kremlin for its refusal to submit and follow the dictates of Uncle Sam.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Why then do I categorize Trump as a peacemaker? That comes from his perverse and ignorant destruction of the American global hegemony by his dispensing with Soft Power, with \u00ab\u00a0shared values\u00a0\u00bb and relying instead entirely on force, on open blackmail to \u00ab\u00a0negotiate deals\u00a0\u00bb with America’s allies in Europe and Asia. This comes directly from the President’s own personality, his DNA, his experience in dealing with past business partners from \u00ab\u00a0a position of strength\u00a0\u00bb rather than as a seeker of compromises and \u00ab\u00a0win-win\u00a0\u00bb solutions.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Trump’s vulgar familiarity, his open treachery, his public humiliation of his interlocutors complement his reversal of long-standing shared policy decisions on the Iran nuclear deal, on Climate Change, on the Trans-Pacific Partnership, on the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership and on NAFTA..<\/p>\n<\/p>\n The establishment understood correctly that Trump spelled disaster for the edifice of a rules-driven world order they had cultivated so meticulously for the past many decades which paid handsome financial dividends to America’s ruling classes, who have been eating the world’s lunch. But it was and remains inconvenient to explain precisely what was wrong. And so we read balderdash written by such iconic commentators as Roger Cohen whose latest feuilleton in The New York Times<\/em>speaks of a \u00ab\u00a0moral rot that threatens America\u00a0\u00bb emanating from the Oval Office.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n The prevailing thinking among political analysts in alternative media – be it The Duran, Consortium News or Russia Today’s Peter Lavelle on Cross Talk – is that this obnoxious US president will have his way and that the US grip on the world will continue despite his excesses. They tell us Europe will \u00ab\u00a0cave in\u00a0\u00bb to Trump on Iran and ultimately impose the sanctions that Washington demands. It is argued that the European leaders may talk tough now, but that the business reality is such that flaunting Washington comes at too high a price given the discrepancy in volumes of trade with the USA as opposed to Iran. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n However, these analysts overlook not only the possible effects of Trump’s altogether indecent humiliation of friendly leaders but also the issue of existential national security, which everywhere and at all times outweighs commercial advantage in determining interstate relations. The simple fact is that Europe abhors the notion of a nuclear Iran which the existing convention prevents effectively, or, more generally, of a nuclear-armed Middle East at its doorstep. Europe also firmly opposes a wider conflagration in that area such as Trump’s revocation of the nuclear pact with Iran heralds. These are concerns which make a \u00ab\u00a0cave-in\u00a0\u00bb impossible, whatever the measure of personal courage of European leaders.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Trump utterly lacks discernment and is being egged on to commit unpardonable blunders in foreign policy by the \u00ab\u00a0mad dog\u00a0\u00bb civilian advisers like John Bolton whom he appointed to look and sound tough. His pursuit of primitive mercantilist policies such as the promotion of overpriced US liquefied gas to Europe to replace Russian pipeline gas through Nord Stream II, which he is pressing Merkel to scuttle, make a mockery of shared Atlanticist interests and values, and expose to ridicule at home any European leaders who might be tempted to stand by his side.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n One cannot overestimate the significance of the harshly condemnatory statements addressed to Trump and the USA this past week by both European Commission President Jean Claude Juncker and by European Council President Donald Tusk. Tusk said trenchantly about Trump \u00ab\u00a0with friends like this who needs enemies.\u00a0\u00bb Juncker called for activation of a 1990s EU \u00ab\u00a0blocking law\u00a0\u00bb to protect European business from the effects of secondary US sanctions for continuing to do business with Iran. The given mechanism was launched the next day, this past Friday.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n It must be recalled that both of these leaders were installed by Angela Merkel. Their firmness in repudiating Washington’s bullying and wrongheaded position on Iran represents not merely their personal views but the views coming from Berlin, which for the last decade at least is the guiding force in EU policy, both foreign and domestic. Moreover, by an irony of fate, the harshest denunciation of the United States is coming precisely from the Pole Tusk, former head of the ruling party in Warsaw. It has to be recalled that Tusk’s Foreign Minister, Radek Sikorski, acknowledged his country had been giving Uncle Sam \u00ab\u00a0a blow job.\u00a0\u00bb For these reasons, I think the US game is up thanks to the good work of the current occupant of the Oval Office.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n The problem of non-compliance with US sanctions against Iran is multi-dimensional and it is clearly too early to say how this will play out. Experts agree that in any case the financial infrastructure for trading with Iran, SWIFT, will this time, unlike the last US-led sanctions on Iran imposed in 2012, remain in place. The \u00ab\u00a0blocking law\u00a0\u00bb offers some financial compensation to European companies facing penalties in the United States, though Chancellor Merkel has said this is unlikely to be sufficient. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n A major question is what the European companies<\/em> will actually do. First indications are not encouraging, with Maersk, the world’s largest shipping company and French oil giant Total indicating they are closing operations with Iran, the former, or will do so if they are not given explicit exemptions by Washington, the latter. But these are just straws in the wind. The European blocking law is likely to give more comfort to small and medium sized European companies than to the very largest companies with heavy US involvement. So only time will tell whether ongoing trade and investment with Iran will be sufficient for Teheran to continue to honor the nuclear deal.And then there is the question of how much assistance will actually be rendered by the two countries standing most resolutely by the side of Iran: Russia and China.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n The possible failure of the US sanctions on Iran because of noncompliance would not stand by itself. It comes in the context of multiple disputes between the US and its allies in which trade and sanctions figure heavily.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n America’s policies of global economic gendarme and issuer of unilateral sanctions on its competitors, not to mention adversaries is uniting opposition to sanctions regimes as a tool of foreign policy overall. The opening skirmishes of a US-initiated trade war with Europe over steel and aluminum has focused minds.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Meanwhile, it is notable that a new government about to be installed in Italy has made the lifting of US-led sanctions on Russia one of the several key policies of their coalition. And while it is easy to say that Europe has heard this before, from Austrians, from Czechs, from Slovaks, from Greeks who did not and do not share the enthusiasm of Brussels in applying sanctions to Russia, they were all two-bit countries who lacked the demographic heft and the economic weight to go up against the 28 and enter a veto. Italy has that scale and as a founding member of the EU, its intended veto of the sanctions may well be the game changer so many of us have waited for. But this is ignored or discounted by Donald Trump’s administration which has announced plans to implement still tougher sanctions on Russia over the vaguely termed \u00ab\u00a0malign influence\u00a0\u00bb they say Russia exerts on Europe.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n By overplaying his hand, Donald Trump is hastening the collapse of US global hegemony and of the triumphalism that has guided bellicose behavior, risking war by intent or miscalculation. In this way, Trump has been unwittingly fostering global peace.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n ***<\/p>\n<\/p>\n If Trump is a peacemaker by his promotion of policies destructive of US power, Vladimir Putin is a peacemaker by conscious choice. This is not to say that Putin is being dovish. Quite the contrary is true. Putin is the living embodiment of the principle of ensuring peace by preparing for war.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n In his recent debate with Ambassador Michael McFaul at Columbia’s Harriman Institute, Professor Stephen Cohen noted that Vladimir Putin has a demonstrable long record as \u00ab\u00a0reactive\u00a0\u00bb to American and other Western encroachments on Russia’s national interests and is in no way the aggressor, as our governments and media insist. Those of us with open minds and clear vision have long noted Putin’s characteristic restraint, refusal to respond to provocations in haste or in an intemperate manner.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n This behavior pattern goes straight back to his early days in power, when Russia was shocked to receive as reward for its generous support to the United States following 9\/11 back of the hand treatment from Washington. From the Russian perspective, the US decision to abrogate the ABM Treaty in 2002, removed one of the key features of global security dating back to the early 1970s. It was plain to see that the US objective now was to achieve strategic superiority over Russia in the one area that justified its claims to a seat on the governing board of international affairs, its nuclear triad. With the planned construction of anti-missile bases in Europe that could also serve as launchers of attack missiles, the United States would obtain a first strike capability.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n At the time, Putin strenuously objected to this US program, which he said would require Russia to make counter moves to ensure its security. However, Russian warnings went unheeded and in 2004 Putin informed Washington that his country would now proceed on its own to develop asymmetrical systems of defense against the US anti-ballistic missile infrastructure developing at its perimeter. This message only evoked derisive commentary among NATO officials behind closed doors. After all, they reasoned, the much diminished technical and financial levels of the Russian Federation rendered the country’s come-back as a military equal improbable.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Nonetheless, Putin persisted in his plans and on 1 March 2018, in his annual Address to the joint session of the Russian parliament which also served as the key speech of his electoral campaign, Vladimir Putin revealed publicly what Russia has done in the past 14 years to restore strategic nuclear parity with the United States for the present and for the foreseeable future. He presented the functional characteristics of some eight new and technologically unrivaled weapons systems including hypersonic cruise missiles and drones operating at the ocean depths. These systems all have in common virtually unstoppable delivery of nuclear payloads which, in the cutting analysis of Russian commentators in the following days, turn the entire US anti-missile infrastructure which cost hundreds of billions of dollars, into a modern-day Maginot Line. That is to say the Russians had used some of the best minds on the planet, scientists who did not go overseas in pursuit of comfortable jobs in Silicon Valley working on the latest i-Phone but instead worked with dedication and patriotism to ensure the country’s survival. They had effectively managed these technical teams in tight budgets measured in orders of magnitude less than comparable programs in the United States to produce game-changing defense systems that are already deployed (the Dagger) or will soon be put in serial production (Sarmat).<\/p>\n<\/p>\n \u00ab\u00a0You did not listen to us before. Now hear this.\u00a0\u00bb Those were the words of Putin after he presented the new systems. But instead of threats to \u00ab\u00a0bury\u00a0\u00bb the West, as Nikita Khrushchev once used, Vladimir Putin used his announcement to call upon the Americans and others to enter into new arms control negotiations.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Was anyone listening? To judge by the mainstream American media, the frivolous discounting of Russian capabilities continued unabated after Putin’s speech of 1 March. We were told that this was only an electoral stratagem to get additional votes, that no such systems exist, that Putin was bluffing. However, American political leaders with an inside knowledge of defense realities, such as Senator Dianne Feinstein (California-D), long-time chairwoman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, were listening. She and three other Senators issued a public call to then Secretary of Defense Rex Tillerson to immediately reopen arms control talks with the Kremlin. Then the President himself in his congratulatory message to Vladimir Putin on his successful re-election said that it was important to meet in the not too distant future to talk about arms control because the arms race was \u00ab\u00a0getting out of hand.\u00a0\u00bb<\/p>\n<\/p>\n One may object that talk is cheap, and that these recognitions of new Russian might were largely kept from the American public. In this case, American actions speak louder than words. In the cruise missile attack on Syria on 14 April to which I alluded at the start of this essay, the United States scrupulously took measures to ensure no harm would be done to Russian military personnel in Syria, so that the military impact of the attack was essentially nill. In short, the Russian President’s speech ensured full attention was given in Washington to the threats of Chief of the Russian General Staff Gerasimov to shoot down ships and planes launching missiles at Syria if Russian red lines were crossed.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n The last, and perhaps the only true realists in the US power establishment, the military command in the Pentagon clearly no longer disdain Russian capabilities and determination.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n In a broader sense, it is also salutary and helpful to the maintenance of global peace that Vladimir Putin made it clear that Russia is ready to press the nuclear button, even if it spelled collective suicide, in case it came under attack from the United States. This came out in the course of a special film on Putin that was released during the campaign. He explained to the interviewer that he did not want to live in a world in which the Russian Federation ceased to exist and would respond to attack accordingly.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n This clarity compares favorably with the wishy-washy position of British military and civilian top leadership that came out in a BBC pseudo-documentary entitled \u00ab\u00a0World War Three. Inside the War Room,\u00a0\u00bb February 2016.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Equal military power, readiness to use it in the face of existential security threats, clarity of thinking and restraint: these are all the elements which combine to make Vladimir Putin a major contributor to global peace.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n ***<\/p>\n<\/p>\n It is a curious feature of our confusing and vexing times, that some of my peers remain hopeful that a Summit meeting of Putin and Trump might provide a breakthrough in relations that would end the global stand-off and usher in an era of peace. They even go so far as to hope for a US-Russian strategic partnership.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n From the foregoing, it should be obvious that any possible rapprochement between the United States and the Russian Federation is a project for the distant future and cannot come earlier than a fundamental change in thinking of the US establishment from global hegemony to positioning the US as just one of several peers at the table working on the basis of consensus, not Diktat. That day will not come soon.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n In the meantime, arm’s length relations between the two heads of state will be entirely sufficient and justified. All that is needed is mutual respect, and as Trump’s recent meetings with foreign leaders demonstrates, respect for others is not part of his mindset. It will be far better if any negotiations with Russia are held at the working level to ensure open lines of communication and clear understanding of the other side’s red lines.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n This, too, will pass. Perhaps the outcome of the 2020 US elections will open new perspectives.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Deux \u00ab\u00a0faiseurs\u00a0\u00bb d’une dr\u00f4le de paix 1erjuin 2018 – Il y a une d\u00e9cade (le 20 mai 2018 sur son blog dit La Parole Franche, ou usforeignpolicy.blogs.lalibre.be), l’excellent commentateur et historien Gilbert Doctorow a consacr\u00e9 un essai \u00e0 deux hommes qu’il d\u00e9signe comme les deux \u00ab\u00a0pacificateurs\u00a0\u00bb, ou \u00ab\u00a0faiseurs de paix\u00a0\u00bb (peacemakers) de l’\u00e9poque, – que… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"neve_meta_sidebar":"","neve_meta_container":"","neve_meta_enable_content_width":"","neve_meta_content_width":0,"neve_meta_title_alignment":"","neve_meta_author_avatar":"","neve_post_elements_order":"","neve_meta_disable_header":"","neve_meta_disable_footer":"","neve_meta_disable_title":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[8743,3066,17854,2628,12716,2803,2700,3318,18331,2701,18332,6157,916,2779,2639],"class_list":["post-77971","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-faits-et-commentaires","tag-8743","tag-americaniste","tag-businessman","tag-diplomatie","tag-doctorow","tag-effondrement","tag-equilibre","tag-force","tag-gilbert","tag-harmonie","tag-pacificateurs","tag-paix","tag-poutine","tag-puissance","tag-trump"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77971","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=77971"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77971\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=77971"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=77971"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=77971"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
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Blessed the Peacemakers: Trump and Putin<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
\u00ab\u00a0Blessed the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God…<\/em>\u00a0\u00bb (Matthew 5:9)<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
Gilbert Doctorow<\/h4><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"