I watched a program on the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) yesterday where apologists of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and European Union (EU) criticized Putin’s invasion of Ukraine on the premise that they do not want Europe to remain divided into two hemispheres: Eastern Europe and Western Europe, with the corresponding political ideologies (socialism and capitalism) that separate them. From their words, I deduced Western Europe’s desire to extend “democracy” to Eastern Europe. In the guise of globalizing “democracy”, the US, supported by its Western allies and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), invaded Iraq and Libya in recent times. In some of these case studies, national leaders of these countries were assassinated in a draconian manner, as it was the case with Gaddafi.
The 19th century formed the roots of the United States’ foreign interventionism, from which countries such as Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Afghanistan, Haiti, Panama, Vietnam, India, Cuba, North Korea, Japan, Mexico, etc were invaded. The assassination of Thomas Sankara and Patrice Lumumba are some instances where the US and the CIA have not only undermined other country’s sovereignty but killed its leaders. To the US and liberal scholars, “democracy” is the best form of government to administer man which must be imposed on the rest of the world. In contradistinction, history books tell us of benevolent detectors who were able to usher the people into prosperity while observing their rights. In our clime, democracy has wreaked more havoc on humanity here than any known natural disaster.
Those who are intellectually alive and have been following global trends for some time now will know that what is to be globalized here is capitalism, not democracy. The US and the West are merely hiding behind the pretense of democracy to advance capitalism in Eastern Europe under the argument that all states have the right to enlist in organization they desire.
To me, the US has become a meddlesome interloper that wants to be seen and heard everywhere on earth. NATO and the EU’s protestation to admit and register Ukraine, Zelenky’s determination to make this happen, and Putin’s firm resolve to wade off the EU and NATO from Eastern Europe and the expansionist agenda of Western Europe may yet throw up some cataclysmic waves of perturbation and distress that will threaten global peace. On its part, Russia is bent on bringing about some paradigmatic changes in the international arena by reviving the legacies of the socialist ideology that held sway in Eastern Europe in the hay days of the defunct Soviet Union. Von Clausewitz’s argument that “war is a continuation of politics by other means” may yet serve to explain why Putin offered to invade Ukraine to drive his ambition down to preserve his country’s geopolitical relevance in the East and Europe in general.
In the final analysis, states’ participation and relations in the international arena are determined solely by their national interests as defined in their domestic and foreign policies. They’re not encumbered by issues of morality like international law and respect for the territorial sovereignty and integrity of other states. The counteracting sanctions that have been dished out by FIFA, UEFA, International Chess Federation, Formula One, etc. to restrain Russia’s continual invasion of Ukraine and to limit Russia’s involvement in international activities are merely designed to further the interests of their paymasters—the US and countries of the West. These organizations can not remain neutral in this fight.
This is an ideological battle rather than an economic one.To remain relevant in the international arena, all remote and proxy actors involved in this fight are simply attempting to preserve the legacies of the political and economic ideologies to which they subscribe.
–By Inakefe Gabriel
