Opinion

The razor's edge

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"The road to salvation is like walking along a razor's edge". Said the holy man whom the protagonist of "The Razor's Edge" (W. Somerset Maugham), a survivor of the Great War, wounded in the soul and since then tormented by the randomness of life and death in the trenches, went to look for in the mountains. Salvation and peace coincide in the narrow dimensions and prolonged expanse of its edge. Balance and abyss walk together in life, as do the plans of strategy and negotiation in war.  

Polarisation when the intervention in Iraq (2003); the use of force in Georgia (2008), the annexation of Crimea (2014), the Donbass, thereafter. Invasive energy trade, with large investments and agreements that will reach relevant countries in Central Europe, Germany and Italy. Disinformative activity and social and political influence, through media networks and unstructured activist groups, but with the capacity to act simultaneously or successively in episodes of protest against economic deterioration and social weakness: the crisis in Greece, independence in Spain, Brexit in the UK, the yellow waistcoats in France. The construction of an alternative discourse to the Euro-Atlantic to promote the erosion of European and American institutions. A series of apparently incoherent phenomena without a plan.  

The successive weaving of soft alliances in Asia. Complementary to the autonomous strategies of emerging powers such as China and India. Permeable to the common interests of becoming stronger, but impervious to Russia's objectives. And simultaneously, recovering the position lost in Syria and opening the door to cooperation with regional powers such as Turkey and Iran. And, successively, to build a network of political alternatives in Latin America, following a model of populist shock, experienced in the Cold War, but reconfigured in the era of democracies through political action. And to multiply its presence in Africa through the use of mercenaries, investments, support for weak governments or insurgent groups. Plans for a hybrid and global war. 

Who would think that this set of events is a product of chance and not a planned response to challenge and undermine the Western order. Led by the all-powerful US and its allied web of avatars, unbeatable in the face-to-face but vulnerable in allegorical and multi-domain scenarios, which are built on the demagogic fissures of liberal democracy itself: permeable in its territorial and digital borders; incapable of establishing itself in a globalised framework; invaded by uncertainty; and comfortable in its obsession with making ends meet.   

The US, with its vicissitudes, is also developing security and defence plans in Europe, Asia and globally. Slowed by the strategy of responding to the attacks on the Twin Towers and rebuilding its vulnerability to terrorist action (2001-2008). And then by the economic crisis and the need to rebuild its image and alliances in the Middle East (2008-2016). But this priority of the fight against terrorism did not prevent the Euro-Atlantic plans from incorporating Central and Eastern European and Baltic countries into NATO in various enlargements and negotiations in 1999, 2004, 2009, 2017, 2020 and 2022. And from 2017, with the new security doctrine, the United States will face the new international dynamics of rivalry and competition between powers as a strategic priority focused on Asia, but also with a European and global orientation. The strengthening of Western alliances and the creation of new ones (Aukus, Quad), the multi-domain vision, the use of intelligence and hybrid operations (Maidan) have also been used in US policy. The razor's edge in international relations has narrowed so much in a decade that it has ended up causing Ukraine to fall into the abyss.  

This protracted power rivalry has been planned, sometimes explicitly and sometimes more subtly, in recent years. Analysts and a few politicians, the fewest, have warned about the course history was taking, but society has failed to grasp its significance. Now that it has become clear that war in Western territories is not only possible and imaginable, but probable and evident, the possibility of peace is improbable and incomprehensible. Although negotiation plans exist, as do limits on the use of force and limitations on the objectives of the contenders. The razor's edge is narrow and long. But only the survivors can walk it.