Alternative foreign policy for South Asia

The Easter Sunday terrorist attacks in Sri Lanka on two catholic churches and an evangelical church and two other five-star hotels have paralysed all possible imagination and thinking as to why these innocent people were made victims for some hidden conspiracy. 

Some clarity began to evolve when the ISIS undertook responsibility for the bombings. Then, the links were exposed when a local group called National Tawheed Jamaat (NTJ) as the immediate perpetrators of the event. Debates and discussions in the Sri Lankan society mushroomed in various directions. 

In the aftermath of the event, this article probes the manoeuvre of US imperialism to regain its dominance in Eurasia (Europe and Asia) and the Asia Pacific. 

It also deals with the foreign policy of Sri Lanka – which originated in the Non-Align Movement (NAM), eventually was drawn more towards the dominance of the US and now opportunistically leaning on China and India for its survival. 

It is important to study this topic of a foreign policy for South  Asia so that we concentrate on this relationship between Eurasia and the US. The subject of Eurasia is taken into consideration due to the new relationships and links that have developed, especially during this post-globalised world. 

The US developed into a world power after World War I and bypassed British imperialism and got fully-established after World War II. All the structures established at the Bretton Woods really consolidated the capitalist system. 

But today, the US is being challenged from every corner. Historically, the US was able to bypass the bi-polar system due to the collapse of the Soviet Union and became all-powerful uni-polar world power. Today, it is being heavily challenged by the whole of Eurasia and we are facing a world situation on the verge of collapse. 

The Belt and Road Initiative is to control Central  Asia, South Asia and the Asia Pacific

The US passed through the earlier period trying to take control of oil fields of the Middle East. It was a continuous war to grab oil resources of the former Ottoman Empire. Already in 1947, the US established the State of Israel by evacuating the Palestinian communities from Palestine to the Gaza Strip and the West  Bank and consolidated their police regime in Israel. 

The Arab world had already in 1950s an experience of overthrowing world powers like imperialist British and French when General Nasser nationalised the Suez Canal. This rescuing the Arab lands gave a tremendous impetus to anti-imperialist mood of the colonial world. 

In 2011, the whole Arab world Tunisia, Egypt, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Libya burst out in mass struggles due to the onslaught of neo-liberal policies – the most significant feature was seen in Tunisia in the general strikes of the workers. In Egypt, the workers came out on a general strike and the leadership was eventually taken over by the Muslim brotherhood. 

In Iraq, even though they were able to execute Saddam Hussein, the US couldn’t defeat Iraqi people’s uprising and the US allegation of Iraq possessing “weapons of destruction” showed that the US was bullying the Arab world. This was the second awful blow to the US prestige after the defeat in the Vietnam War. 

With the crisis of imperialism through a process of transferring from a bi-polar system to that of a uni-polar, and with its decadence today, the capitalist system is compelled to face a multi-polar integration. 

LESSONS FROM ARAB SPRING

What is significant in the 2011 Arab revolution is that the working class has played a prominent role initiating the revolutionary breakthrough and a way forward. Secondly, the neo-liberal globalised world system has totally failed to satisfy the basic needs of humanity when mankind is reduced to be the scum of the earth. 

If the revolutionary forces were not properly motivated and directed to achieve a collective and communitarian structures in the physical organisations of society, the end result would be extremism, racial and religious fundamentalism, devastating terrorism and will eventually end up in barbarism. 

ROOT CAUSE OF BARBARISM 

The megalomaniac US elitist leadership is awfully suffering from an incorrigible inferiority complex. They are losing control of the globalised market. The only way they react is through a protectionist market. By imposing tariff taxes on Chinese commodities, it seems to think it will be able to come to full grips of the market. It brought restraints on Huawei electronic products, but this giant Chinese company can easily find outlet markets outside the US. 

The trade war between the USand China has become so unbearable to the US economy that Trump has to realistically face the situation by calling for a truce with China. 

EURASIA INTEGRATION - A THREAT TO USA

The dominant feature creeping in to this volatile political situation is Russia strongly engaging itself with China. These two countries have built up a lasting relationship, most probably due to the awful threat of the US, but of course in its weakest situation. The US and China have signed a Comprehensive Partnership Agreement and have consolidated it several times. 

Chinese and Russian Presidents Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin met in a Moscow Summit on June 5, 2019 and inked a Comprehensive Partnership Agreement instead of a bilateral treaty. This paved the way for an upgraded Eurasian integration. It was at this summit that the Presidents reached agreements of the interconnection of the New Silk Road with the Eurasian Economic Union. The area comprises in and around Central Asia aiming at a concerted strategy for the total Korean Peninsula. They have also discussed how to link up Iran in the New Silk Road or Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). Already before the Moscow summit, both leaders have given assurance that the US demand for a “regime change” in Iran was not acceptable. Putin and Xi consolidated the road map for integration at the St. Petersburg Economic Forum. 

Again, the greater Eurasia  interconnection continued to be woven at the Shanghai Corporation Organisation (SCO) summit in Bishkek, with India, member of BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa), and a member of SCO, Iran as an observer. In this SCO summit, there were Putin, Xi, Narendra Modi, Imran Khan and Iranian President Hassan Rouhani. But there is behind the back stabbing done by the US-China  trade war, sanctions on Russia and the explosive situation in the Persian Gulf. 

KEY QUESTION IN EURASIAN STRATEGY

To establish the strategy to face the US threats is to await the decision of India. But Narendra Modi seems to have been a strong participant in the Bishkek summit, SCO summit and probably in the St. Petersburg Economic Forum. This whole process will be finally consolidated at the G20 meeting in Osaka. 

The RIC (Russia, India and China) formation will definitely be very effective in facing the US bullying but temporarily it will make the moribund capitalist system gain breath in its agony. 

CHINA AND RUSSIA

Today, both these countries are capitalist, making all possible efforts to grab the resources of Central and South Asia. Although China and Russia were branded as socialist countries, they have turned totally capitalist. The neo-liberal policy has survived for nearly 70 years due to massive capital accumulation in Russia and China. The BRI of China is the effort to plough all the lands and resources untouched by capitalism. 

The US imperialism in utter desperation is making every effort to subdue individual countries like Iran, North Korea. The US fears China’s effort. The Belt and Road Initiative is to control Central  Asia, South Asia and the Asia Pacific. 

The competition is becoming so sharp that the US is at the losing end. The US has entered into bilateral agreements even with countries like Sri  Lanka for geo-strategic purposes. If the Chinese BRI is established, it will be a threat to the whole US strategy. The US has already signed three major agreements with Sri  Lanka – ACSA, SOFA and MCC – mainly to get military access on ground, sea and space for vessels, planes and other military equipment. 

Alternative world foreign policy RIC will definitely give some breathing space. If any alternative is not proposed, the world will lead to chaos. 

The only possible force will be the working people (working class) of the world. They should move forward to develop the world, to take control of all resources of production. International working people not only of Eurasia but the whole Arab World and the US must join together. Let 4th International take this initiative to unite working people of the world to usher in a communitarian society.