Mirror Image

Suppose you were a US government official and you read the following in a Russian or Chinese state-owned newspaper op-ed page:

One of the most intriguing ideas is the creation of a treaty-based "Concert of Autocracies" that, like COMECON or the Warsaw Pact, would admit members only if they met strict requirements. The new institution would allow the authoritarian states to work together as a concerted force within such institutions as the United Nations and could eventually replace the United Nations as a forum for legitimizing international security actions if the United Nations itself proved resistant to reform.

Holy shit, right? New Cold War! Right there in the newspaper. So how are Russian and Chinese officials supposed to react to Jackson Diehl's op-ed in The Washington Post?

Comments

Well, if the alternative is unilateral wars of choice based on a pack of lies, they might be pretty keen on the idea!

And what if Putin said he had secret KGB prisons, and was building new nuclear bunker buster bombs that were not any more effective than conventional ones, or if Putin declared that they had revised their torture policy so that he was the arbiter of what was and was not torture? What might they think?

Posted by theCoach | November 28, 2006 5:16 PM

I believe that a very similar institution already exists and is called NATO, and has been quite successful the past 60 years. And yes, Russia does feel threatened by it.

Posted by Danny | November 28, 2006 5:45 PM

But Matt, Diehl doesn't work for the government.

Posted by dj moonbat | November 28, 2006 5:45 PM

Something close to this, say a caucus of democracies, in the UN general assembaly would be a good thing overall. Or is anything that might provoke China or Russia in the slightest a bad idea, regardless of any good that might be accomplished?

Posted by Cain | November 28, 2006 5:52 PM

That we know of.

Posted by dj moonbat | November 28, 2006 5:52 PM

A more basic question is:

what do we want from Russia and China?

what are we ready to trade for it?

Most recently, we heard that China and Russia could do "more" about nuclear ambitions of North Korea and China. Do we want them to? Is it important for us? What are we ready to trade for it?

As far as "concert of democracies" is concerned, similar question should be posed.

All to often, people claim that if we only exercise leadership and resolve, others will follow. Some, yes, but only some.

Posted by piotr | November 28, 2006 6:05 PM

I really don't see how this can be a criticism of Diehl's op-ed. And I'm not sure it makes sense as a criticism of the Princeton Project either, because while cooperation with Russia and especially China are surely essential parts of future U.S. strategy, so is being in a strong position from which to negotiate with them

I'm therefore taking it to be a criticism of a certain style of right-wing commentary that reads the public pronouncements of politicians or pundits in other countries and responds, "These people are planning to do things that aren't in our interest, let's kill the shit out of them right now." But if that is the point of this post, you're asking your readers to do an awful lot of work to get to it, Matt.

Posted by washerdreyer | November 28, 2006 6:06 PM

Matt, I thought you said before that you agreed with the princeton project report. Is it wrong when the Washington Post quotes from it. And, your posts seem to always advocate never annoying the Russians; see your post below on selling out free peoples in Eastern Europe to Stalin, sorry I meant Putin. And you call yourself a liberal! Maybe we could do the deal at Yalta, or better still somewhere in Bavaria, a city would be good, any suggestions; anyone?

Posted by pt | November 28, 2006 6:15 PM

So, your point? That Anne-Marie Slaughter and G. John Ikenberry should not consider themselves scholars but rather diplomats who are intellectual hostages to the Russians and the Chinese? Gee--I know that you're poles apart from them in the emerging debate over Democratic foreign policy, but can we have such a debate if we start off by declaring whole swaths of opinion out of bounds? Surely the blogosphere is enough of a fetid swamp of ad hominem attacks, etc. not to further poison discourse like this. It's really not that much different from accusing people advocating withdrawal from Iraq of giving aid and comfort to terrorists.

Posted by David | November 28, 2006 6:18 PM

Well, it is still not half as bad as the frequent demands to declare war on foreign countries (esp Iran and N. Korea), often by people known to be well connected with the administration. If foreign papers continually printed demands for large scale assaults on the US we'd never hear the end of it, but Krauthammer and co just go right on.

Besides, as soon as McCain's elected all countries not in the US's best graces probably will be signing a defensive alliance (entirely justifiably). That man has war on the brain.

Posted by JohnTh | November 28, 2006 6:19 PM

The problem is that the United States needs a lot more from Russia and China right now than it can reasonably coerce from them. This means cutting deals with Moscow and Beijing, which in turn means we don't have the freedom to provoke them all that much. Had America not spent the last six years blowing all its diplomatic capital and credibility on the greatest foreign policy disaster in living memory, things would probably be different. But here we are, and we don't have the freedom to suddenly start up large international counter-Russia coalitions right when we're going to need to ask them to help us out.

Posted by Christmas | November 28, 2006 6:27 PM

So, your point? That Anne-Marie Slaughter and G. John Ikenberry should not consider themselves scholars but rather diplomats who are intellectual hostages to the Russians and the Chinese?

I think you're badly misreading Matt here. His point is not that Diehl's writing is hurting America or something - rather, his point is that Diehl's idea is massively dumb. Diehl is proposing a new cold war. That's dumb.

Failing to propose a new cold war doesn't make you an "intellectual hostage" - it makes you a person who isn't proposing a very bad idea.

Posted by DivGuy | November 28, 2006 6:55 PM

It's like Annie Hall come to life.

Posted by SomeCallMeTim | November 28, 2006 7:01 PM

Hang on, it's not Diehl's idea; Diehl is quoting Slaughter/ Ikenberry, albeit favorably. Matt's criticism isn't really of Diehl, it's of them.

Posted by pt | November 28, 2006 7:06 PM

Uh, why should any of the other democracies join this 'concert' ?

After all the democracies that pointed out how iraq had no WMDS and no chance of getting them. Or that Iraq had no connection with 9/11. Or that invading iraq would almost certainly lead to an all out civil war, were treated with contempt by the US ,by both republicans and democrats.

The notion that they should now sign up for some half assed pile of crap on the basis that US politicans have somehow learnt to pay attention to allies merely because a slightly different bunch of US politicans have been elected is suprisingly naive.

You think Gordon brown(for instance)is going to waste any political capital at all in trying to pretend that than an alliance with the US is worth his while ?

As for the french , germans, spanish etc, why should they ?

After all what if this 'concert of democracies' insisted that to be a member that legalised torture was right out? How could the US join then ?

Posted by kb | November 28, 2006 7:09 PM

I gotta say:

When I first skimmed this entry, I was hopeful that Russia and China actually had set up a "Concert of Autocracies", dedicated to spreading evil in the world. The representatives, from places like Belarus and Pakistan and Zimbabwe, would all wear masks and have really cool code-names -- e.g. The White Russian.

I hope I am not alone when I say, if this is what cold war looks like, I don't want to see peace.

Posted by apk01004 | November 28, 2006 7:35 PM

um, Matt's hypothetical alliance of autocracies actually *already exists.* Its called the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. Russia, China and a bunch of Central Asian dictatorships formed it in 2001. One of its core principles is non-intervention in the affairs of sovereign countries. Here's its official website:

http://www.sectsco.org/home.asp?LanguageID=2

If the autocracies are already organizing, I don't see a problem with the democracies doing the same.

Posted by rd | November 28, 2006 7:39 PM

This Concert of Democracies will fail for exactly the same reason the League of Nations failed: States - even democratic states - do not share a "harmony of interests". E. H. Carr demonstrated this 70 years ago and I cannot believe "serious" people still haven't learnt the lesson.

kb points out an obvious discord, but there are others: Will the Concert be able to stop a rogue democracy from invading another country? Will the "Concert" outlaw the death sentence as is the case in every advanced democracy? Will this "Concert" be able to force the US and Australia to join up to the Kyoto Protocol?

If the Concert cannot move on these - and other - issues, then it will be worse than useless. It will de-legitimize the democratic form of government even as it remains the best hope we have for empowering the weak and the dispossessed.

Posted by Sean Kellett | November 28, 2006 7:55 PM

We need secret organizations to trick us into building allies for Iran in the MidEast.

Why? Because the Bush Admin won't last forever.

Posted by Jeffrey Davis | November 28, 2006 8:02 PM

"a treaty-based "Concert of Autocracies""

Russia and China, obviously, don't actually refer to themselves as "autocracies", and neither does any other country. The problem would more likely be what to do when Russia applies for membership in the Concert of Democracies. Given that Russia's President currently has an approval rating of about 70%, whereas ours has an approval rating around 35%, and that there is no Iranian or Communist-style system in Russia excluding inappropriate candidates from elections, I have trouble understanding what the grounds are for excluding the country from a "Concert of Democracies". Russia's authoritarian character is more a matter of the lack of separation of powers, freedom of expression and freedom of the press, and rule of law. And the same goes for Venezuela. The problem would be that Russians would be unable to understand why they were being shut out of a alliance of "democracies", and would see it as a Russophobia thing -- just as they did with NATO expansion. And to some extent, they'd have a point.

Posted by brooksfoe | November 28, 2006 9:06 PM

I'm stuck on the part where I'm supposed to imagine a U.S. government official who reads foreign newspapers.

Or any newspapers.

Posted by Nick | November 28, 2006 10:54 PM

Following up on theCoach above, this kind of thing represents a downshift from total whacked-out scary craziness to ordinary U.S. hegemonic arrogance. That kind of ordinary arrogance did make us more vulnerable to the attack of craziness we just had, since our "foreign policy establishment" was preconditioned to think U.S.=good, everything else=bad, we are the World Leader of Everything, etc., but it is still a step in the right direction.

Posted by MQ | November 28, 2006 11:44 PM

"Suppose you were a US government official and you read the following in a Russian or Chinese state-owned newspaper op-ed page..."

I would remind myself the Washington Post is not state-owned.

Posted by kyle | November 29, 2006 11:50 AM

One of the most intriguing ideas is the creation of a treaty-based "Concert of Autocracies" that, like COMECON or the Warsaw Pact.

Actually, from my admittedly paleo-leftist perspective, what Diehl is proposing is EXACTLY that: a new Concert of Autocracies, explicitly modeled on the original one, set up at the end of the Naploeonic wars to prevent any repetition of that disagreeable French Revolution business.

The original was backed by Tsarist muscle, earning Russia the nickname the "Gendarme of Europe." What Russia was then, the USA has become now -- the "Gendarme of Globalization." It's nice work if you can get it.

Posted by PeterP | November 29, 2006 12:25 PM

Is it in the United States interests to be a member of a newly formed concert of democracies? Yes or No?

That's really all that matters. Discussion of unintended consequences is a legitimate point, but ultimately it's got to be about us.

That's not even to say it's a good idea, but if it isn't, it wouldn't be because it might make some other state not happy.

Posted by DRR | November 29, 2006 2:13 PM

rd:
i'm curious as to why you would classify the SCO as a "concert of autocracies." the organizaiton is purely regional in nature and while all of the members happen to be autocratic, two of the observers (Mongolia and India) are democratic. Furthermore, its goals are anti-terrorisism and promoting economic cooperation and development in Central Asia. The organization is rather loose and not very "bloc-ish" in nature.

Posted by jen | November 29, 2006 4:33 PM

I'm sure sco has some purely utilitarian, regional aims. but if you look at the statements that have come from meetings over the past several years, two broad principles are stressed: non-interference in the internal affairs of sovereign countries (warding off external demands for democracy, human rights) and the "democratization of international affairs." (counterbalance against the US, and possibly the EU.) Is it a fully functioning alliance, or even much of a threat? No, although it certainly helps countries like Uzbekistan avoid isolation for its hideous internal record, after the US finally flinched at it. But sco is in effect a self-conscious autocratic grouping, and it may become an increasingly ambitious one.

Posted by rd | November 29, 2006 9:42 PM