WHAT AMERICA WE NEED
Igor Muradyan
Comments – Tuesday, 30 October 2012, 20:21
What kind of America do we need? It is impossible to think of a
more stupid wording but everyone thinks so, including the British
aristocracy, oligarchy, the Russian government, the governments of
Iran and Israel, as well as China, Turkey, Georgia, Mali, leaders of
the Kurdish movement and all the others. Nevertheless, the question
“what kind of America do we need?” is meaningful because it will be
necessary to conduct a feedback policy, adjust to what is in place
and what will take place.
Any state has a certain degree of freedom in conducting a foreign
policy and it means that dependence on great powers is a relative
circumstance. The issue of international dependence is a phenomenon
that defies interpretation. Apparently, the majority of 200 states,
despite the modest military and economic potential, functionally
exists “by themselves” and needs no support for their security and
foreign political interests. Such strong and influential states as
Turkey and Israel are in a significant foreign political dependence
which has been obvious over the past decades of modern history.
In the current state of affairs the most effective means of influence
on world powers or big states is cooperation with them, participation
in one alliance or another but any influence is highly relative.
At the end of Reagan’s epoch marginal political scientists who knew
America superficially tried to figure out and analyze the reasons
and factors of polarization of the social and political life and
policy of the United States. These theses can hardly be referred
to as a complete political analysis but these thoughts turned out
to be oracular. The opposition of right conservative and liberal
ideologies intensified in the United States, and the culmination
of this opposition was during Bill Clinton’s term of office. Even
with such striking differences in the political and social ideology,
the Russian experts of the U.S. and Canada Institute of the Russian
Academy of Sciences, as well as outstanding scholars of France and
Great Britain, kept on the safe side regarding the growing differences.
In November 2008, as Obama won the presidential election, the streets
of Paris were cheering with such excitement and admiration as if Obama
was the president of France. Clearly, all the components of the left
project of Europe and many other countries perceived the victory of
Democrats and the president of the United States with openly left
views as support to the global left liberal process.
It is characteristic that during his tenure Obama has divided and
introduced elements of discord in the right conservative camp of
Europe when part of right centrists readily supported the democratic
administration since otherwise a lot of European politicians and
parties of Europe would have appeared in a rather unfavorable situation
and not only in terms of foreign policy.
Bushism which contained everything except real neo-conservatism
certainly facilitated Obama’s victory but it is clear that besides the
notorious middle class and mildly speaking the less secure classes
of the society certain other layers have occurred in the United
States that even the leading American sociologists have been unable
to identify. Like the U.K. the United States is biased to the left,
and it is impossible to overlook it.
However, we should mostly take interest in the foreign political
tendencies of the United States, the change of the paradigm,
to what extent the Democratic Party has stopped being a party of
war and the United States follows the path for self-isolation. An
outstanding U.S. army official called this situation “self-destructive
self-isolation”.
In fact, the architecture of the U.S. policy and security established
after World War II presupposes an active foreign political and military
expansion and presence. The discharge of these ambitions will, one
way or another, lead to fresh crises and catastrophic consequences
of geopolitics which was created at one time as counteraction to the
upcoming expansion of the United States.
In this period of Obama’s policy Turkey’s regional expansion
intensified and though the U.S. policy on its blocking and isolation
proved quite successful, the U.S. approaches supposed shift of most
responsibility for conducting this policy to Turkey’s neighbors
and opponents.
The United States has partly transformed the nature of its presence and
its interests in the South Caucasus. It may be quite effective for the
interests of the United States and it is possible that the Republican
administration would conduct a similar policy but we are interested
in the political style which is more typical of the Republicans. We
do not need a smart America, we need an ambitious America, and it
is clear that under George Bush’s administration Armenia felt more
comfortable though most probably it was not understood by the Armenian
political elite.
Armenia’s interest in the U.S. policy is not limited to the problem
of the international recognition of the genocide. It is obvious that
the American elite was close to the recognition but did not reach a
consensus which is related to Turkey’s current dependence on the United
States although Turks continue to demonstrate an independent line.
Without spending political resources the Americans have assured
Turkey that further campaign and independence will lead to loss of
territorial integrity and a lot of strategic advantages, as well as
collapse of its economy. One may claim that the Turkish discussion
in Washington and the Turkish project have been latent but successful
in Obama administration.
In addition, there is no doubt that the settlement of the
Turkish-Armenian relations has been an important component
of the Turkish project. Armenia is interested in the close
confrontation-partnership between the United States and Turkey.
Armenia is hardly able to use this but one could have expected bigger
and more painful mistakes on behalf of the Armenian government. One
way or another, the issue of our policy stands out.
At the same time, Obama administration is done with its policy on
Turkey and it is not known whether further soft constraints over
Turkey will continue. Besides, Obama administration has committed
a crime – cynical deception of an entire people regarding such a
painful issue. Therefore, the Armenian voters of the United States
must demonstrate their attitude to this inappropriate behavior,
especially that the geopolitics of the Republicans will not be less
useful for the interests of their historical homeland.
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