1-4-24
Dear Partners in Thought,
I wanted to share with you in this rather long (but much needed) piece the last book by Jim Sciutto, whom some of you may know as CNN’s chief national security analyst, and anchor of CNN Newsroom (I see some eyes raising in the deep right side of the room). Sciutto is an interesting man with a diplomatic background, having been posted at the US Embassy in Beijing, before joining the news network in 2013, from where he has reported from 50 countries and many conflict areas in the world. He has written many books focused on geopolitics and security matters, such as “The Shadow War” (previously reviewed on this blog) dealing with the vast array of asymmetrical challenges posed by Russia and China over the last twenty years. “The Return of Great Powers” (with a telling if not worrying sub-heading “Russia, China and the Next World War”) is about the new world we have known following the thirty years or so of “peace through trade” and globalization, with less attention to a clash of the great powers as there was only one: the US. As often mentioned in previous posts, the world game has been changed by the steady rise of China, even with its challenges, and Russia’s existential fight for relevance, using old-fashioned (if not forgotten) warfare in Europe, with other world players acting along opportunistically with their own interests at play.
One of the differentiating features of Sciutto’s book, that covers topics that became well known, is that he was often not only on the ground, but also dealing directly with key political, diplomatic, military and intelligence officials providing him with their views of unfolding events – from CIA director Bill Burns to President Zelensky and his key staff. Other useful contributors were his many talented CNN colleagues in the thick of it in all theaters covered by the book, combined with his ability to connect the dots between this war and broader world issues and players. Sciutto’s book is different in that he stresses the return not only of the great powers but also of a 1939 (I would even say Munich 1938 at times in parts of the West) or pre-world war moment, also one where former Cold War guardrails and communication between major actors is no longer effective, thus potentially leading to global chaos. As if to confirm the disturbing feeling, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk expressly warned that Europe was in a “pre-war era” in late March. In times when small wars in exotic places may no longer be the norm (October 7 and Gaza being seen as contradictions even if they are also linked to great power conflict through their local allies or surrogates), the book focuses on the new development of the forgotten return of history with direct great power war. In this context, Sciutto covers how Russia plans to bring the international order down while China is aiming at creating an entirely new one. As a student of history (like many military leaders) General Mark Milley, former Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, stresses that the new era we are witnessing often goes back to the old confrontation between a revisionist and a status quo power which usually ends up in armed conflict (not something the populations of the West in particular would like to hear today).
Sciutto stresses that our new world is now marked by actual and potential great power conflict areas ranging from the obvious Ukraine and Taiwan but also extending to Russian aspirations in the Baltics (a key driver for the West to stop Russia in Ukraine and not allowing an unhinged Putin to go “further”) as well as China’s land claims in the South China Sea. Other theaters include North Korea’s incessant missile threats to its Southern neighbor and US bases in Asia, the East China Sea with Russia and China conducting joint-exercises, or the often-visited and tested Alaskan coasts by Chinese balloons and the once-unexpected Arctic.
The change in our world happened with both Ukraine and Taiwan being the new focus of the world order we knew and most in the West liked from the early 1990s. Sciutto’s book starts unsurprisingly with the Russian invasion of Ukraine, a topic now well covered over the last two years, but with a personal angle as he was in Kyiv for CNN when it all started in late February 2022. US and British intelligence services had gathered evidence of a clear massing of Russian troops near the Ukraine borders with Russia since November 2021, while Putin kept stressing they were for defensive purposes as NATO and Ukraine were threatening the motherland – all while having worked hard academically at creating a historical scenario of imperial rebirth for the invasion to come. There was a refusal to see the obvious until the last minute in many Western capitals – apparently not frontline Helsinki that was used to a well-perceived dangerous neighbor – as if there was too much desire for the world order they knew to remain. While many Western capitals worked hard at maintaining what they saw as a productive dialogue with Putin, such as Paris for a while, Foreign Secretary Lavrov visiting Liz Truss kept stressing only a few days before the invasion that troop movements inside Russia were nothing like thousands of British forces in the Baltics at Russia’s doors. On December 17, 2021 Putin had made clear that Russia wanted the withdrawal of NATO forces from territories of members having joined as of 1997, no new members like Finland and of course never Ukraine. Then while Western intelligence was proven right they also failed to predict the actual resistance of Ukraine and failure of Russia to seize Kyiv in 72 hours, which turned out to be almost a bigger surprise than the invasion itself.
The war in Ukraine marked the imagined and often controversial “end of history” as stated by Francis Fukuyama post-Cold War which meant that the age of large armed forces and great power conflict was behind us. The new era of globalization became marked by smaller conflicts, a downsize of the past militaries and their budgets as well as supply chains and a new focus on long and often challenging counter-insurgencies like in Iraq and Afghanistan. One of the striking points of the book stressed by US Admiral James Stavridis, that evaded many, was that the Ukraine war also quickly became a hybrid proxy war with one great power fully engaged with troops and firepower and the other not with troops but with money and ammunition (one could add before the Mike Johnson-hijacked House of Representatives went on vacation when a bill was needed, even if Europe was still there for Kyiv notwithstanding its challenging Hungarian issues). Ukraine provided a wake-up call to a new era at multiple warfare levels. It is clear that ammunition, even if not troops on the ground, were a key factor for Ukrainian prowess on the battlefield like with US
High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS), which gave them a clear advantage on the battlefield. Ammunition also became a key issue, as there was a struggle for the West to produce enough to meet both Ukraine’s needs and their own going forward (a US assessment of needed artillery rounds on the battlefield was a need to increase production by 500% as Ukraine was firing in two or three days what the US then produced in one month).
While the world would see Ukraine invaded by Russia, the battlefield showed rather quickly Ukrainian forces regaining territory and being on the offensive to recapture lost territory while Russian forces suffered terrible losses, showed poor command, and were actually on the defensive to retain invaded grounds. The first Ukrainian counter-offensive in 2022 showed quick results while the second one in the summer of 2023 was painfully slow as Russia had built up its defenses, learned from mistakes even if losses continued to be staggering. However, a striking point was the adaptability of Ukrainian forces, due also to the training of their officers and key NCOs by NATO since 2014, this in stark comparison with the Stalinian-inherited very top-down, controlling decision-making, leading to little or no initiative, itself reserved to the highest ranks (NCOs were indeed the missing link in the Russian military and some would say the Chinese military when thinking about a potential invasion of Taiwan). Russian forces are not well-trained and can only win by massive firepower often aimed (if the word was right) at both military and civilian targets leading to scorched-earth type campaigns like in eastern Ukraine, also at the price of heavy losses as lives do not matter to their high command as seen in the last two world wars and to some smaller extent Afghanistan. As Ukraine recovered some territory like at Kherson, and did not lose as was expected, the main question became as Sciutto stresses “could it win?” At the same time and beyond the official messaging, Russia can see its inability to conduct efficient conventional warfare given its poor readiness which might explain (if it were ever possible) Putin’s frequent reminder of Russia’s nuclear capabilities, making them “no longer unthinkable” a warfare option that one of Sciutto’s chapter deals with in detail.
The Ukraine invasion solidified the dividing line of what is a new Iron Curtain between the West and Russia, while Putin expected a weak and disunited West to not care about Russia going West, all the more so as it did not much react to the Crimea and Eastern Ukraine invasion of 2014 even if carried out initially by “little green men” as if from outer space. The Western allies’ rush to provide Kyiv with military equipment assistance like HIMARS and Storm Shadow cruise missiles helped stop the Russian “blitzkrieg”, however incompetent Russian conventional warfare was. Russia’s invasion strengthened NATO to an unexpected point with Sweden and Finland, two historical neutral countries bent on dialogue with Russia, eventually joining the Alliance after dealing with challenging Turkish and Hungarian members. NATO, born in 1949 to stop Soviet expansion plans in Europe, grew to 32 members, including 14 from the former Soviet Warsaw Pact, within two years of the invasion, this stressing Russia’s miscalculations in addition to their failed military achievements.
Another consequence of Russia’s invasion was a redefinition of the West’s posture alongside Europe, all the more so as Russian and China were seen to get closer in relation to dealing with the West via a “No Limits Relationship”, thereby also creating global challenges for NATO in spite of its initial focus on Europe. Russia and China share a common adversary, if not de facto formal enemy for the latter, in spite of being very different in their overall profile. China also has a GDP six to ten times that of Russia, while Moscow has 20 times the nuclear weapons China does (and the number one world rank in that category) – showing the odd and historically scary profile of Russia. Both Putin and Xi share a restoration mission to correct the historical wrongs imposed on their nations by the West (Putin indeed spent much time and academic resources focusing on rewriting history to justify his invasion of Ukraine, which he sees as an integral part of Russia). Not since Mao and Stalin have both countries been in such lockstep on the creation of a new global order, stopping the end of the rules serving the “golden billion”, and involving a confrontation, if not war, with the West, this even if China is the more rational of the two in its actual definition and implementation of the latter. Putin would stress that this new system is not directed against “third countries” (Ukraine not being really one to start with) and that China (he needs at any levels) faces a threat from the US and its allies in Asia as much as Russia is threatened by NATO (the preemptive driver to attack first in Ukraine).
Sciutto feels that the extensive damage to Russia’s ground forces will compel Putin to rely upon unconventional weaponry such as cyber, space and even tactical nuclear capabilities – hence his often stark and shocking statements. Similarly, Russia, while turning into a war economy that will sustain for some time the appearance of vigor (at 7% of GDP today), will need military equipment support from its allies. While China has been so far reluctant to provide lethal weapons to Moscow, in spite of the no limits relationship asserted just pre-invasion, the likes of Iran and North Korea will assist Russia, drones being an example for the former, and this against more sophisticated weaponry they also need. Washington aptly stressed the “red line” that Chinese military support would cross with some success (even if Beijing would unlikely take that stance), many remembering a similar red line that was crossed by Damascus and forgotten by the Obama administration about the use of chemical weapons during the Syrian civil war. As Sciutto stressed, if China could not help Russia militarily, one of the ways to benefit would be to prolong the war in Europe as long as possible, also to weaken the West by draining financial resources and military stockpiles, this also to foment gradual disunity and create a key distraction as Xi gears its military and people for war over Taiwan, even if still unlikely today. It would also happen that China might be the one to need military equipment support, especially in the field of submarine technology where Moscow is a leading player, even if not directly useful in terms of its invasion of Ukraine.
NATO is not simply about Europe in the reshaping of the world order. One of the key side developments of the war in Ukraine was for Japan and Australia to take steps to strengthen their ties with the West. Canberra joined the AUKUS agreement with the US and the UK, even if creating an awkward snub of France with whom they had signed a contract to buy diesel submarines. The UK, Japan and Italy got together to work on a next generation of fighter jets, while Japan and the UK signed an historic defense agreement in January 2023. The US, Japan and South Korea signed new trilateral partnership at Camp David in August 2023, also having a positive impact on the relationship between the two Asian countries which has been challenging since World War II. Key Asian and Australasian countries clearly stated that the invasion of Ukraine also mattered to them in terms of their own security as making the world less stable and as a result strengthening the Western camp beyond the unexpected expansion of NATO. The Ukraine war and its impact, combined with concerns about China, led the US and Japan to sign a new security pact 64 years after the previous one to upgrade their arrangements and face the global threats presented by the new multipolar world order.
Going into more active mode, Sciutto takes part in a Baltic Sea naval mission of the High Readiness Joint Task Force (VJTF in NATO-speak) where we deal with a German flagship Commander named Marx and Spanish and Portuguese ships in a first mission together that shows what NATO is also all about. NATO’s Maritime Command today is led by a Briton, his Deputy being Italian with key officers from Spain, Germany, Portugal, Canada, Turkey and Greece. We see how Russian fighter jets shadowing the ships threaten their NATO counterparts in close encounters beyond the accepted norm, not as rogue pilots but as merely reflecting the approval of their higher-ups to create a hostile environment. Sciutto makes the point that, while the Russian ground forces have suffered devastating losses in personnel, equipment, and pride, their Air Force and Navy have remained largely untouched barring a few key losses of surface ships like the flagship Moksva in the Black Sea from drones expertly managed by Ukrainian forces. We learn that Russian submarines are viewed as top quality by NATO, especially in terms of non-detection, leading US naval forces to urgently upgrade their own fleet in a more competitive and dangerous environment. We also learn that civilian infrastructure, often a Russian target, led NATO to create a division to protect these naval assets like undersea cables and pipelines in the Baltic Sea. Sciutto tells us about a conversation with Marx about the famed diplomatic, economic and energy engagement policy of Germany with Moscow personified by Angela Merkel, soberly stating that the desired outcome was right – a point I also fully agree with, having been a proponent of peace though trade as a way to ensure that the likes of Russia had more to gain by being integrated into the world system until irrationality and wild restoration desires prevailed. It is worth noting that Germany put aside its Word War II guilt (found by some to be eminently practical) and made a rapid reassessment of the need for military spending in the months following the Ukraine invasion – even if implementation takes time (but hopefully as the third economy in the world today it will show results) while having been the largest, by far, European financial supporter of Ukraine behind the US to date. As a last point of his maritime exchange, Sciutto noted a worrying point about the German youth following a YouGov opinion poll reported by Die Zeit: Only 11% of them would be ready to defend their country while only one in twenty would volunteer to do so and nearly 25% would flee to avoid service – a sign of our peaceful times post-Cold War and their associated features especially for people living in a very enjoyable (and perhaps declining) West. It is fair to stress that when Macron, having made a total u-turn in dealing with Russia, mentioned the possibilities of French troops being eventually sent to Ukraine, only 21% approved in a poll conducted after his statement.
Arriving in Tallinn, the capital of the small Baltic country of Estonia, where the VTJF ended its mission, on the very front lines of a potential aggressor and revanchist power, Sciutto covers more interesting features at play. Estonia and the Baltic states (all NATO members) and Moldova dealing with a pro-Russian Transnistria (even if calmer, as to its Russian roots judging from the recent low participation in the Russian presidential “election”) are obvious potential next steps for Moscow post-Ukraine, all the more so if the latter was to fall under Russian control. Sciutto engages with Kaja Kallas, the new Estonian Prime Minister and flamboyant leader going through the challenging history of her small country and why it “may be next” for Russia that considers it part of its “empire” or sphere of influence, something many NATO allies still do not understand, all the more as “the Western world survived very well without us for fifty years” (Tallinn is about 200 miles from St Petersburg while – news to many – Helsinki is only 50 miles away). Estonia is a tricky land, as Tallinn’s population of five hundred thousand is 40% ethnic Russian, like Eastern Estonia, making “street support” to visiting NATO units, not always obvious even if a clear majority backs the alliance. One of the key successes of Kallas following the NATO Summit in Madrid of June 2022 was to make sure NATO realizes that while its esteemed members should really stick to the 2% of GDP committed to defense – she was elected on a program of tax increase targeted at enhancing Estonian defense – it should also not rescue Estonia “within 180 days” as previously planned but within days if not hours if it were invaded, hence the following frequent VTJF visits which Sciutto was part of.
Sciutto’s book covers many related topics, like the sensitive one of Taiwan as a potential or actual target of Chinese expansionism, with the two old red lines being challenged: “no invasion” for the US and “no independence” for China and what the Ukraine war taught Taipei. The two chapters about Taiwan show the potential dual negative scenario that could be followed by Xi – him being the key and only decider for China today – between a gradual Hong Kong-like economic asphyxiation leading to surrender, or a more challenging invasion mirroring the Russian scenario for Ukraine (US war games still showing a crippled but independent Taiwan given the perceived Russian “features” of Chinese forces). The topic of Taiwan deals with many interesting features about its key players and issues. Xi, a one-man state today if any, is seen as far more ambitious and wanting fewer restraints than his predecessors, learning about the Ukraine invasion as Taiwan does, while being like a Putin, though one far more pragmatic and realizing that failing to conquer Taiwan, should he go forward with such a dangerous plan, would be his personal failure, so likely too much to risk. Sciutto’s take on Taiwan is also interesting as while President Biden boldly stated many times the US would intervene militarily in the case of an invasion, breaking the usual official American stance of what amounted to “supporting diplomatic neutrality” or as it is known “strategic ambiguity”, the Taiwanese leadership still prefers to be ready to defend itself rather than relying on needed but still uncertain US support, given its costs, even if the population of Taipei often behaves as if no invasion would ever occur, based on the last 70 years of tensions that led to no actual conflict. Other chapters show us the rising potential for nuclear confrontations following Putin’s direct statements reflecting Russia’s obvious conventional challenges with what is also becoming a multifront global power war in terms of means – cyber, AI and sheer disinformation – and geographies – the Arctic or “near space” (via balloons, a new tool seen in early 2023 over the US) or the sheer weaponization of space with rockets. In another chapter, an unstable and surprisingly (to many of his former White House staff) often Hitler-admiring Trump, who likes autocrats as they can do what they want unlike him when President, is seen as “a wild card” in the unfolding global game. Sciutto discusses the key impact of Trump’s reelection in 2024 with a possible withdrawal from NATO on the back of past friendly relations with Putin, and an election-driven isolationism of another age to appease his admiring voter or cult base. Paths to peace that still exist are then explored by Sciutto on the back of what history taught us, like the Cuban missile crisis of 1962, without surrendering to despotism in Ukraine and globally. As a conclusion Sciutto stresses the long nature of the war the West is now facing as the old world is vanishing and a new one gradually emerges with its new chessboard, challenges and clear priorities. One of the key paths proposed to keeping the peace is “international rules and agreements plus (US and Western) power” to ensure practical world stability among great powers. In this respect, even if a land for peace agreement could eventually be envisaged to stop the war of invasion, Ukraine cannot be lost for the sake of its sovereignty but also for the survival of the international order so as to avoid opening a Pandora’s box of domino theory for the twenty-first century.
On a personal note, and while understanding the axis Moscow wants with China and which Beijing has supported at times in some measured ways, I feel that the latter is not as confrontational as the former and today Xi is not Putin. China, while not being a Western democracy (a fact rooted in history we need to accept productively), faces some key demographic and economic challenges and despite making noises of an historic nature about Taiwan and related matters, still relies upon globalization, notwithstanding peace through trade no longer being the once post-Cold War key driver of international relations. Even if Xi would want to fulfill his historic reunification with Taiwan under his third term in office, he first needs to deliver economic prosperity to his people, all the more so if the invasion would appear too risky. Globalization is also shown in the China-Taiwan trade with China representing 40% of the 21st world economy’s trade besides 70 years of strong sovereignty issues linked to the creation of both countries. Even if new security agreements between the West and its Asian allies are understandable given our changing times, there is nothing to gain from severing all trade and investment ties with China as if a dangerous decoupling was wanted (surely by Moscow), this even if the West should pay attention to geopolitical matters linked to trading with Beijing including undue influence in its domestic affairs – hence the “de-risking” moves taken by the US in areas deemed important to its security interests (as seen with state-backed hackers like APT31, new EV imports or in the tech sector with actually unpopular TikTok regulations). There is nothing to gain from antagonizing Beijing as long as it behaves rationally about matters like Taiwan so it does not get closer to Russia in unacceptable ways. In spite of an increased fight for influence with the West and its allies, also across Asia-Pac, or sensitive trade issues with both the US and EU, China may realize that it can gain much more by striking a productive dialogue with the West in a mutual win-win mode rather than following a Russia that may go down a more erratic and lost path during and following the war in Ukraine. Xi’s recent welcome to Beijing of top US business leaders in late March seems to show his preferred focus for sensible expansion through trade rather than risky hostilities.
Similarly, it is key for the West – especially at times forgetful Western Europe and especially but not only its new generations – not to fall into a Munich 1938 mode that would reflect the feeling that Russia would stop after seizing control of Ukraine so it would make sense to cease an expensive support of Kyiv today. This Munich mode, while dangerous, is also accompanied by a politicization seen in America in an election year when the support of Ukraine is part of a game for the tiny majority of the Republican House of Representatives to deny the Biden administration any major win regardless of the geopolitical stakes for the West, including America. It is clear that the West switching gears in terms of defense would mean higher taxes and/or a reduction of the Welfarist social contract, especially in Europe, which is challenging after decades of actual peace and little or no memories of the last world war, but it is key for the West to be realistic and change old habits as a matter of deterrence and potential survival. Necessary historical changes like the key one expressed by German chancellor Scholtz on defense in mid-2022 need now to migrate in their natural acceptance from chancelleries to households. As Tony Blinken stressed, Russia would not want to expand the conflict across Europe as it could likely not manage it – at least now – but it is not a reason to adopt a Chamberlain approach to the war in Ukraine hoping for rational behavior (if the word could ever apply in the case of Putin as seen with his initially odd comments targeting Kyiv following the recent ISIS terror attack in the Moscow theater). As always, the Latin motto of “Si vis pacem para bellum” and what it entails, as stressed in previous pieces, does matter now existentially for the West and especially Europe more than ever.
Warmest regards,
Serge
Desperate Measures 