We're Gonna Fight: International Edition
Understanding the changes coming at us.
The world is currently in the midst of a realignment as momentous as the one at the turn of the last century. Many people around me, even those who are intellectually up to speed on things, are still showing a lot of that deer in headlights look. Let’s review the state of the world with an eye on structural balance, which I first wrote about eleven years ago in Imperial Alliance Networks.
Coming to grips with this is a non-trivial process …
Attention Conservation Notice:
There are going to be a lot of heavy branches in this one in terms of reading. You need some history, some economics, some foreign policy, some network analysis and a LOT of being able to just discard your worldview because it’s out of date. My writing in the area started in 2013 - 2014, back when I used to pick a biannual area of study. This is an autist’s circumscribed interest …
Begone, Bipolarity:
If you’re going to have an extremist isolationist nationalist populist movement, which we do, there are some hate speech tropes in play. In particular, Dualism and Demonization are problematic for understanding this era. The demagogue must select an other, drive a wedge between them and “the people”, and then disseminate absurdities until they get the desired atrocities. We don’t just disagree, the “other side” are fundamentally evil … the sort of evil that contains implicit permission to do violence.
The following are inescapable dichotomies in 21st century America.
male/female
left/right
red/blue
black/white
good/evil
god/devil
The Global War on Terror was fundamentally a religious conflict, the first contractions of the west trying to give rebirth to Christendom. It happened in the context of the globalization the U.S. created as a defensive measure against Communism shortly after the completion of World War II. That wasn’t a calculated thing, it was just what we’ve come to expect as normal.
And it is SO not normal, there are no historical precedents for it. We’re going back to the way things used to be.
Structural Balance:
The period between the unification of Germany in 1871 and the outbreak of World War I in 1914 saw six intermediate configurations as six European powers chose sides before the festivities began.
The world then fought two global wars with a shattering economic crash between them. The Rules Based International Order of Bretton Woods II, the United Nations, NATO, and the Warsaw Pact was concocted largely by the United States with the specific intent of heading off a third similar conflict with Communism that would feature the availability of nuclear weapons.
While not an explicit objective there was an implicit anti-imperial aspect to this. Western Europe’s much decreased imperial holdings after WWII fought to free themselves, leaving us with us with cultural shorthand like Entebbe and the 1972 Olympics.
No, Really, Bipolarity Is Over:
Have a look at Anders Puck Nielsen on the nature of things. We’ve been trying to hammer the opponents of the rules based international order into a single boogeyman, when what we really have is a network threat.
China, Iran, North Korea, and Russia are opposed to their position in the big scheme of things. There isn’t some grand plan, Xi is not in charge because China has the largest economy and population, although that contributes capabilities and constraints to their role in things. Iran and Russia would be delighted to see the west fall. The China of the 21st century exists due to its efforts to fit into globalism and the minute that’s gone the fuse is lit for a catastrophic dissolution. An investment lead economy that plays at being an export driven one, but which imports 80% of its agricultural inputs, is not going to do well when frayed global supply lines start to snap.
China can talk tough on Taiwan, but the minute they act tough the Japanese and U.S. navies are going to pinch off their shipping, Singapore will show the Houthis how one really exploits a shipping choke point, and a quarter billion people get to starve for Xi’s vanity.
Trade Flows:
That being said, you may not use the notion of a “side” beyond the bounds of a bilateral interaction. What does this global network look like? Maybe A stack of Sankey diagrams would be a way to visualize it and get at the implications of conflict.
So that’s dated but it’s visibly legible, it speaks at one level we need - countries and regions.
That first one was logical, this one includes geospatial issues, focused on the strait of Malacca. This five hundred mile long slot is the windpipe of Chinese trade. If it constricts, even partially, things get funny for them really, really quickly.
There are the top eight global shipping choke points. What’s going on with them?
Panama canal - volume down one third due to drought.
Bab-elMandeb & Suez - volume off 10% due to Houthis drone attacks.
Hormuz - we’re balanced on a knife edge over Israel v. Iran.
Malacca - JAUKUS alliance is specifically about how to close this path.
Bosphorus - closed by treaty to Russian and Ukrainian warships due to war.
Only the Cape of Good Hope and Gibraltar remain unimpeded. And for Russia, Finland and Sweden’s joining the alliance turns the Baltic into Lake NATO.
Two years ago the Danube, Loire, Po, and Rhine all experienced marked decreases in barge traffic due to low water levels, and the next year the Mississippi traffic was off by at third. The issues with these inland shipping routes is environmental rather than geopolitical, but it’s a problem globally.
The Mississippi’s fall annual minimum flow corresponds to the maximum flow of grain from the U.S. plains. Pinch that traffic flow and net importers start to go hungry. Remember Arab Spring? Now tell me what the world look like when that amp gets turned to eleven.
Brexit Breakdown:
Brexit was the first major regional trade block breakdown, with the U.K. own goaling themselves into a position from which they can not recover. The COVID19 pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine are covering other brewing frenemy problems. Again, we’re constrained by bipolarity, so most of us miss the signs.
Nine years ago when I complete the Challenges in Global Affairs Specialization there was an entire section on the breakdown of the Doha Development Round of talks. As the U.S. ability and interest in serving as the policeman of the world declines, much like the decline of rainfall in Europe, we’re going to see trade flows start to bottom out. Local coalitions will step up to ensure portions of the system … but it’s just as likely alliances might form to restrict access. I think we forget that we lost access to the Suez canal for eight years between the Six Day War and Operation Nimbus Star/Nimbus Moon.
Conclusion:
Globalization is dependent on a layer cake of sea lanes (security), rivers (climate), and feeder rail networks (energy). As parts of this system start to break we’ll see old regional rivalries eating away at the perception that people, money, and goods are free to flit about the globe unimpeded.
Our future is going to look more and more like our past. We’ve already got WWII style swarming aerial attacks, WWI style trench warfare, Victorian era gunboat diplomacy, and piracy problems. And climate change will just keep turning up the heat.
I’ll leave you with this five hundred year old map of the Hanseatic (trade) League network in northern Europe. Among the 31 states that make up Germany today, you’ll find the Free Hanseatic City of Bremen and the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg, two remnants of that much older construct.
