唐納德·川普的逆基辛格戰略
唐納德·川普的逆基辛格戰略
作者 Vijay Prashad
美國總統川普致電俄羅斯總統普丁，告訴他美國政府致力於烏克蘭的和平進程。作為協議的一部分，川普政府明確表示，烏克蘭東部和克里米亞的部分地區仍將掌握在俄羅斯手中。川普的國防部長皮特·赫格塞斯在北大西洋公約組織（NATO）總部發表講話稱，假設烏克蘭會回到 2014 年之前的邊界是“不現實的”，這意味著克里米亞不會成為與俄羅斯的任何談判的一部分。他說，對美國而言，烏克蘭加入北約是不可能的。赫格塞斯告訴北約，美國並不「主要關注」歐洲安全，而是將自己的國家利益放在首位。北約的歐洲領導人所能做的最好的事情就是要求烏克蘭在會談中佔有一席之地，但是他們幾乎沒有反對美國要求俄羅斯做出讓步以加入談判的壓力。赫格塞斯表示，烏克蘭和歐洲可以發表意見，但議程將由川普制定。 “他決定允許什麼或不允許什麼，是自由世界的領導者川普總統的職權範圍之內的事”，赫格塞斯以典型的中西部口吻說道。他用肢體語言表示，牛仔們重新掌控了局勢。
當赫格塞斯在布魯塞爾時，川普和他的親密盟友伊隆馬斯克正在華盛頓特區。兩國都在大力削減政府開支。在過去五十年中，美國政府規模已經縮減，特別是在社會福利方面。剩下的都是大公司嚴密守護的領域，例如軍火工業。這個行業似乎一直是不可侵犯的，美國軍費開支的削減是不可能持續的。但軍火工業可以高枕無憂（洛克希德馬丁公司除外，因為它可能會失去對 F-35 戰鬥機的補貼）；馬斯克和他的團隊不會削減軍事合同，而是會攻擊軍人和文職僱員。在他的確認聽證會上，赫格塞斯告訴參議員們，第二次世界大戰期間美國有七位四星上將，現在有四十四位。 「參謀規模的大小和戰場勝利之間存在著反比關係。我們的高層不需要更多的官僚主義。我們需要更多在底層擁有權力的戰士」。他說，「可以透過削減成本，讓美軍走向殺傷力」。
人們對川普政府的這些舉措存在著根本性的誤讀。它們有時被視為一位極右翼總統的特殊舉動，其致力於“美國優先”，因此不願進行昂貴且不符合其利益的戰爭。但這是對川普與普丁就烏克蘭問題以及對美國軍隊的態度的通話的短視和錯誤評估。我們不應將此視為孤立主義的策略，而應了解，川普正試圖推行「逆基辛格戰略」，即與俄羅斯交朋友以孤立中國。
川普明白俄羅斯對美國並不構成生存威脅。美國政府並不害怕俄羅斯向歐洲出售能源，因為這些初級商品的銷售並不會破壞美國對全球經濟的整體控制。然而，中國科技和新生產力的快速發展，對美國在全球經濟關鍵領域的主導地位構成了真正威脅。正是美國認為中國構成“威脅”，促使川普採取這樣的對待聯盟和敵人的方式。
基辛格的策略：與中國交好，孤立俄羅斯。
亨利·基辛格（1923-2023）是美國最具影響力的外交政策官員之一。 1969 年至 1974 年理查德·尼克森總統任期內，基辛格主要負責美國的外交政策。尼克森和基辛格都密切關注蘇聯和中華人民共和國之間的爭端。尼克森就任總統時，中蘇圍繞珍寶島的邊界爭端幾乎升級，蘇聯有可能對北京實施核打擊。基辛格意識到，這場爭端對美國具有重要意義，因為它阻止了兩個歐亞大國建立起對抗北約所代表的大西洋聯盟的重要聯盟。基辛格寫道，如果俄羅斯和中國聯合起來，那麼他們將能夠破壞西方在世界上的權力基礎。阻止這種聯盟是根本，而利用中蘇爭端在兩國之間製造嚴重裂痕正是基辛格政策的本質。與中國關係緩和也使美國得以試圖切斷越南民族解放軍在抗美戰爭中的後勤補給線。
為此，基辛格於1970年透過巴基斯坦與中國政府進行秘密會談，並於1971年秘密訪問北京，為隔年尼克森訪華打開了大門。基辛格在訪華後給白宮工作人員的秘密口頭報告中作出瞭如下重要評論：「中國人是極其嚴肅的人。他們並不希望我們過得好。我們對這一點不抱任何幻想。但就我們的總體形勢而言，在蘇聯的壓力和東南亞局勢下，讓中國人加入中國大陸的權力驅動。
蘇聯解體後很長一段時間，基辛格仍然主張美國應該與中國交朋友，孤立俄羅斯，並使歐洲處於從屬地位，以繼續其長期統治地位。這是基辛格 2011 年 600 頁巨著《論中國》中所闡述的基本論點。
川普逆轉：與俄羅斯交好，孤立中國。
隨著蘇聯的解體，美國當局製定了與俄羅斯和中國交好但更親俄羅斯的戰略。外交政策菁英認為，在鮑里斯·葉爾欽 1991 年至 1999 年擔任總統期間，俄羅斯完全服從於美國，俄羅斯將成為歐亞大陸上的次要角色。 1998年，俄羅斯加入G7，這是其屈從的頂峰。基督教在俄羅斯的公開回歸以及俄羅斯面向歐洲的文化的推廣表明，俄羅斯已經接受了其西方傳統，並遠離了主權或亞洲，因此也遠離了中國。 1993 年，美國總統比爾·克林頓致電葉利欽說：“我想讓你知道，我們將長期與你同在。”
21 世紀末，美國極右派勢力發現了兩個因素。首先，中國生產力的技術發展嚴重威脅美國企業的智慧財產權主導地位。其次，俄羅斯新民族主義既建立在主權之上（以普丁愛國政黨的出現為標誌），也建立在白人至上主義和俄羅斯東正教之上（以亞歷山大·杜金的理論為支撐）。美國極右翼的整個集團都把俄羅斯愛國民族主義視為自己的意識形態，把中國共產主義視為自己的對手。
即使在第一個任期內，川普也試圖與俄羅斯交好，以孤立中國並使歐洲處於從屬地位。基辛格戰略的這種逆轉不是進步的，而是同樣的反動和危險的。統一的目標都是確保美國的霸權，同樣的也是分化策略，只是參與者互換。川普隨後被指責為俄羅斯干預的受益者。
美國現在的做法是試圖破壞自2007年普丁在慕尼黑安全會議上正式與美國斷絕關係以來建立的中俄關係。中俄之間的良好合作進展迅速，兩國已就盧布和人民幣貨物和服務轉移達成安全協議。打破這種關係並不容易，但這是川普現在決定嘗試實施的策略。
值得記住的是，基辛格在1971年對中國領導人的評價是：「他們的利益百分之百是政治性的……記住，他們是思想純粹的人。」周恩來於1920年加入了法國共產黨，那時中國共產黨還未成立。這一代人不是為了貿易而打了五十年仗、跑了長徵。 「這種觀點不僅周恩來和毛澤東有之，而且普丁和習近平也有之。過去十年來，他們也在與美國的鬥爭中得到了鍛鍊。一些小玩意不太可能吸引普丁採取川普的反向基辛格戰略。
上述文章最初由 No Cold War在此發表。
By Vijay Prashad
US President Donald Trump called Russia’s President Vladimir Putin and told him that his government is committed to a peace process in Ukraine. As part of the deal, Trump’s administration made it clear that sections of eastern Ukraine and the Crimea would remain in Russian hands. Speaking at the headquarters of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO), Trump’s Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth said that it was ‘unrealistic’ to assume that Ukraine would return to its pre-2014 borders, which means that Crimea would not be part of any negotiations with Russia. NATO membership for Ukraine, he said, was not going to be possible as far as the United States was concerned. The United States, Hegseth told NATO, was not ‘primarily focused’ on European security, but on putting its own national interests first and foremost. The best that the European leaders at NATO could do was to demand that Ukraine have a seat at the talks, but there was very little said against the US pressure that Russia be given concessions to come to the table. Ukraine and Europe can have their say, Hegseth said, but Trump would set the agenda. ‘What he decides to allow and not allow is at the purview of the leader of the free world, of President Trump’, Hegseth said with characteristic midwestern swagger. The cowboys, he said with his body language, are back in charge.
While Hegseth was in Brussels, Trump was in Washington, DC with his close ally Elon Musk. Both are on a rampage to cut government spending. Over the past five decades, the US government has already shrunk, particularly when it comes to social welfare provision. What remains are areas that have been jealously guarded by the large corporations, such as the arms industry. It had always seemed as if this industry was inviolate and that cuts in military spending in the United States would be impossible to sustain. But the arms industry can rest easy (except Lockheed Martin, which might lose its subsidy for the F-35 fighter jet); Musk and his team are not going to cut military contracts but go after the military and civilian employees. During his confirmation hearing, Hegseth told the Senators that during World War II the United States had seven four-star generals and now it has forty-four of them. ‘There is an inverse relationship between the size of staffs and victory on the battlefield. We do not need more bureaucracy at the top. We need more war fighters empowered at the bottom’. He said that the ‘fat can be cut, so [the US military] can go toward lethality’.
There is a fundamental misreading of these moves by the Trump administration. They are sometimes seen as the idiosyncratic flailing of a far-right president who is committed to putting ‘America First’ and so is unwilling to pursue expensive wars that are not in its interest. But this is a short-sighted and erroneous assessment of Trump’s phone call with Putin on Ukraine and approach to the US military. Rather than see this as an isolationist manoeuvre, it is important to understand that Trump is attempting to pursue a Reverse Kissinger Strategy, namely, to befriend Russia to isolate China.
Trump understands that Russia is not an existential threat to the United States. The US government does not fear Russian energy sales to Europe, since these primary commodity sales do not pretend to undermine the overall US control of the global economy. However, China’s rapid development of technology and science as well as of the new productive forces genuinely poses a threat to US domination of the key sectors of the global economy. It is the US perceived ‘threat’ from China that motivates Trump’s approach to alliances and enemies.
Kissinger’s strategy: Befriend China to Isolate Russia.
Henry Kissinger (1923-2023) was one of the most influential US foreign policy bureaucrats. During the presidency of Richard Nixon from 1969 to 1974, Kissinger essentially ran the foreign policy of the United States. Both Nixon and Kissinger closely followed the dispute between the Soviet Union and the People’s Republic of China (PRC). When Nixon became president, the USSR-PRC border dispute around Zhenbao Island almost escalated with a potential Soviet nuclear strike against Beijing. Kissinger had recognised that this dispute was of great value to the United States since it prevented the two large Eurasian countries from building an essential union against the Atlantic alliance encapsulated by NATO. If Russia and China had come together, Kissinger wrote, then they would be able to undermine the foundation of Western power in the world. To prevent that alliance was essential and to use the Sino-Soviet dispute to build a deep wedge between the two countries was the essence of Kissinger’s policy. Rapprochement with China also allowed the US to attempt to close the logistical supply line for the Vietnamese national liberation forces in their war against US aggression.
It was for that reason that Kissinger began secret talks through Pakistan with the Chinese government in 1970, made a secret trip to Beijing in 1971, and thereby opened the door for Nixon to visit China the following year. In his secret verbal report to the White House staff after his visit to China, Kissinger made the following important comment: ‘The Chinese were extremely serious people. They don’t wish us well. We have no illusions on that score. But in terms of our overall situation, with Soviet pressure and with the situation in Southeast Asia, it is in our interest to bring the Chinese in’. Nixon’s epochal visit to China was entirely driven by US interests to divide Russia and China so that the US could establish its power around the Asian continent.
Long after the USSR collapsed, Kissinger continued to make the case that the United States should befriend China, isolate Russia, and subordinate Europe to continue its long-term dominion. That is the underlying argument in Kissinger’s 600-page epic, On China (2011).
Trump’s Reversal: Befriend Russia to Isolate China.
With the fall of the USSR, the United States establishment developed a strategy to befriend both Russia and China, but more Russia. It was thought amongst the foreign policy elite that Russia’s subordination to the United States – under Boris Yeltsin’s presidency from 1991 to 1999 – was total and that the Russians would become a minor player on the Eurasian continent. Russia’s entry into the G7 in 1998 was the pinnacle of that subservience. The return of Christianity in public in Russia as well as the promotion of Russia’s Europe-facing culture suggested that Russia had embraced its Western heritage and moved away from either sovereignty or from Asia, and therefore China. In 1993, US President Bill Clinton phoned Yeltsin and said, ‘I want you to know that we’re in this with you for the long haul’.
A far-right wing section of the US establishment identified two elements in the late 2000s. First, that Chinese technological development of their productive forces seriously threatened the intellectual property domination by US firms. Second, that Russia’s new nationalism had been premised both on sovereignty (identified by the emergence of Putin’s patriotic parties) and on white supremacy and Russian Orthodoxy (such as anchored by the theories of Alexandr Dugin). There is an entire bloc in the US far right that sees in Russian patriotic nationalism its own ideology, and it sees in Chinese Communism its adversary.
Even in his first term, Trump sought to befriend Russia to isolate China and subordinate Europe. This reversal of Kissinger’s strategy is not progressive, but similarly reactionary and dangerous. The unifying goal is to ensure the supremacy of the United States with the same strategy of division with the actors reversed. Trump was then accused of being a beneficiary of Russian interference.
What the United States is now doing is to attempt to break the relation established between China and Russia since 2007, when Putin made his official break from the United States at the Munich Security Conference. Good cooperation between China and Russia has moved swiftly and the two countries have a security agreement underneath the transfer of goods and services in roubles and renminbi. Breaking up this relation will not be easy but it is now the strategy Trump has decided to attempt to carry out.
It is worth remembering Kissinger’s assessment of the Chinese leadership in 1971: ‘Their interest is 100 percent political…..Remember, these are men of ideological purity. Chou En-lai joined the Communist Party in France in 1920, long before there was a Chinese Communist Party. This generation didn’t fight for 50 years and go on the Long March for trade’. This view captures not only Zhou En-lai and Mao Zedong, but also Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping. They too have been steeled in a struggle against the United States over the course of the past decade. It is unlikely that a few baubles will attract Putin to adopt Trump’s reverse Kissinger strategy.
The above article was originally published here
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