What do you think?
Rate this book
The Ukraine War & the Eurasian World Order
Five hundred years of Western hegemony has ended, while the global majority’s aspiration for a world order based on multipolarity and sovereign equality is rising. This incisive book addresses the demise of liberal hegemony, though pointing out that a multipolar Westphalian world order has not yet taken shape, leaving the world in a period of interregnum. A legal vacuum has emerged, in which the conflicting sides are competing to define the future order.NATO expansionism was an important component of liberal hegemony as it was intended to cement the collective hegemony of the West as the foundation for a liberal democratic peace. Instead, it dismantled the pan-European security architecture and set Europe on the path to war without the possibility of a course correction. Ukraine as a divided country in a divided Europe has been a crucial pawn in the great power competition between NATO and Russia for the past three decades.The war in Ukraine is a symptom of the collapsing world order. The war revealed the dysfunction of liberal hegemony in terms of both power and legitimacy, and it sparked a proxy war between the West and Russia instead of ensuring peace, the source of its legitimacy.The proxy war, unprecedented sanctions, and efforts to isolate Russia in the wider world contributed to the demise of liberal hegemony as opposed to its revival. Much of the world responded to the war by intensifying their transition to a Eurasian world order that rejects hegemony and liberal universalism. The economic architecture is being reorganised as the world diversifies away from excessive reliance on Western technologies, industries, transportation corridors, banks, payment systems, insurance systems, and currencies. Universalism based on Western values is replaced by civilisational distinctiveness, sovereign inequality is swapped with sovereign equality, socialising inferiors is replaced by negotiations, and the rules-based international order is discarded in favour of international law. A Westphalian world order is reasserting itself, although with Eurasian characteristics.The West’s defeat of Russia would restore the unipolar world order while a Russian victory would cement a multipolar one. The international system is now at its most dangerous as the prospect of compromise is absent, meaning the winner will take all. Both NATO under US direction and Russia are therefore prepared to take great risks and escalate, making nuclear wan increasingly likely.
404 pages, Kindle Edition
First published February 15, 2024
73 people are currently reading
315 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 27 of 27 reviews
April 12, 2025
The Thirty Years War was the biggest and most destructive war in European history, and was concluded with the Peace of Westphalia which established a multipolar world rather than hegemony (like the US is trying to keep going). This Peace of Westphalia was reaffirmed by the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713 (which ended the War of Spanish Succession). Hillary Clinton would flip out at the idea today of “a balance of power between sovereign equals.” What? A level playing field? Before the Peace of Westphalia, the victors would “punish and subjugate the defeated side” as we see these days in the occupied territories. After Westphalia, conquest and domination was replaced by constraints and cooperation.
After the Napoleonic War there were eight powers that seemingly mattered: Great Britain, France, Russia, Austria, Prussia, Spain, Portugal, and Sweden. It was hard to be a major dick when you were one of those eight since you still had to play well with others. But if you weren’t one of those eight countries, you had to go screw yourself as the rest of the world soon found out. Colonialism, anyone? This led to a Western-centric world order and “collective hegemony”. Racist Rudyard Kipling called it the garden versus the jungle.
“In 1871, Britain produced twice as much steel as Germany, but by 1893 German steel production surpassed British production (and by 1914 Germany produced twice the Brits)”. Too bad those two didn’t compete in cuisine; whoever goes to a German or British restaurant? We were taught about the Marshall Plan being about US post-war generosity, when it was about “removing protectionist measures against US industries”. To help that along, the IMF and World Bank were created, to make other countries formally beholden to the US – a role that ex-economic hitman John Perkins will tell you continues today.
In school we were taught the Cuban Missile Crisis was solved by the US acting heroically tough, when in fact it was solved by the US quietly removing its Jupiter missiles (pointed at the Soviet Union) from Turkey. Advance a few decades and “Henry Kissinger confirmed that Washington had deliberately placed unacceptable demands on Yugoslavia as ‘an excuse to start bombing’.” It was later acknowledged that “the war over Kosovo was primarily about geopolitical restructuring and not humanitarianism.”
Rules Based Order: The Westphalian thing died an ugly death when the US “systematically dismantled” international law since the 1990’s and replaced it with an “arbitrary rules based international order” where the US calls the shots like a Mafia don and others have to deal with it. “International law in accordance with the UN is based on the Westphalian principle of sovereign equality as ‘all states are equal’. In contrast, the rules based international order is a hegemonic system based on sovereign inequality, using international humanitarian law selectively” as the ever paranoid US sees fit.
Fun Facts: The head of the US “Committee to Expand NATO” Bruce Jackson is – wait for it – also the director of strategic planning for Lockheed Martin. Nothing to see here folks. “NATO expansion rejected the Westphalian balance of power, pursued sovereign inequality, enhanced its security at the expense of Russian security, and redivided the continent with a permanent peacetime military alliance.” Never expanding NATO eastward was promised to Russia by James Baker, George Bush, Hans-Dietrich Genscher, Helmut Kohl, Robert Gates, Francois Mitterand, Margaret Thatcher, Douglas Hurd, John Major, And Manfred Worner. The Twitter files “revealed that the Democratic Party cooperated with tech giants to censor its own citizens and the political opposition.” So much for the liberal notion that Democrats are always the good guys.
Color Revolutions: A Washington Post reporter said the NED was the “sugar daddy of overt operations” when you wanted to overthrow governments under the guise of “democracy promotion” and peddle propaganda recast as “information.” An NED (it’s an NGO) co-founder said, “Alot of what we do today was done covertly 25 years ago by the CIA.” If you did your nasty actions out in the open you could no longer be accused being secret about it and thus further tainting the CIA. The key was keeping a perceived distance of the NED from the CIA, which could “undermine NED’s credibility.” All this led to the US financed “color” revolutions in Serbia in 2000, Georgia 2003, Kyrgyzstan 2005, and Ukraine 2004 and 2014.
Ukrainian Yin Yang: Ukraine has two national identities, the eastern portion sympathetic to Russia (20% of all Ukrainians are ethnic Russians) and the western nationalists and kids of those who fought with the Nazis in WWII (now Azov, Right Sector, C14, Svoboda). Every May 9th, in Ukraine, many mourn Soviet victory in WWII in the west, while in the east many celebrate the victory of the Soviets, and some in the middle of Ukraine merely go drinking w/o knowing why. The US historically preferred Ukrainian nationalists and fascists because they were anti-Russian, and anti-communist – easier to buy their allegiance. “The west speaks Ukrainian, the east speaks mostly Russian. Clearly Ukraine must follow the Certs Paradigm and thus be both a breath mint and a candy mint – two mints in one. So opposite is western from eastern Ukraine that Ukrainian neutrality is the only intelligent way forward for Ukrainian solidarity and keep it from civil war. Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022 largely because it had zero assurances of Ukrainian neutrality. No blue and yellow flag waving liberal will tell you that “Between 1991 and 2014, the majority of Ukrainians had very favorable views of Russia and negative views of NATO.”
The US-financed 2004 Orange Revolution brought to power anti-Russian president Yushchenko and US financed NGOs with their expensive 24/7 pro-NATO and anti-Russia propaganda. The Guardian even wrote that the Orange Revolution was “an American creation” involving western branding and mass marketing”. A second Guardian article called it a “post-modern coup d’etat” and a “CIA-sponsored third world uprising of Cold War days, adapted to post-Soviet conditions.” Picture all this money flowing into Ukraine after 2004 to counter the fact that 43% of Ukrainians saw NATO as a threat. By the time of the 2008 Gallup poll, still little had changed with Ukrainians involving NATO. Yushchenko was “deeply unpopular” and Newsweek said he had a 2.7% approval rating at the end of his term. A big problem was that Ukraine’s strongest growth was before he took office when “most of Ukraine’s exports went to Russia and the CIS countries.” The dislike of anti-Russian policies led to Yanukovich being elected in 2010 “which the OSCE confirmed was a free and fair election.” Yanukovich in 2010 approved a bill declaring neutrality of Ukraine which formally kept NATO at bay – had that remained, Russia would never have invaded Ukraine.
Then in 2014 a leaked phone call showed Victoria Nuland of the US boldly plotting regime change with the US ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey Pyatt, when Yanukovich was still legally president. He was then removed and “the allegations of Yanukovich being corrupt were undoubtedly correct, but then so were his predecessors and successors.” Destabilizing Ukraine was quickly rebranded by NGOs as “helping” and “standing with Ukraine.” In March 2014, Foreign Policy ran an article stating, “The uncomfortable truth is that a sizeable portion of Kiev’s current government – and the protestors who brought it to power – are, indeed, fascists.” “The BBC reported that after the (2014) coup, Kiev’s city council was covered in large neo-Nazi banners, the American confederate flag, and portraits of the fascist ally of Hitler, Stepan Bandera.” Nazi whitewashing became commonplace. The first act was repealing Russian as a regional language. “In 2015, the US Congress recognized the Azov battalion as a Nazi organization and subsequently banned US military assistance to the group.” Before you get excited about that, know the US a year later removed the ban on funding Nazis. What were we thinking? Nazis gave us Hugo Boss and the racial rationale for taking land away from Palestinians! “In November 2021, the US and Ukraine were the ONLY two countries in the world to vote against the resolution combatting the glorification of Nazism.” Pause to wave the Ukrainian flag…
Did you know that Crimea has been the home of the Russian Black Sea fleet since 1783? “For two hundred years, since the time of Peter the Great, Russia has attempted to break through the encircling ring of border states and reach the ocean.” Russia saw that the 2014 coup was about NATO’s creep eastward and it then retook Crimea to keep access to its only warm water port. This was a violation of the UN Charter and a breach of the Budapest Memorandum. But “NATO’s Deputy Secretary-General acknowledged in July 2022 that the war in Ukraine is mostly about control over the Black Sea.” More stuff Rachel Maddow will never tell you, let alone that US supported pro-coup protestors burnt down a building in Odessa burning dozens of people to death, and shot people jumping out of the windows or beat them to death on the pavement (p.186). Beating your own countrymen to death merely because you disagree with them, so honorable.
To cool things down, in 2015 the Minsk 2 agreement was signed by Kiev. The US signed on and the UN voted yes to it to make it legal. Western powers immediately set to “undermining it.” NATO’s Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said in 2023 that “the war didn’t start in February last year. The war started in 2014.” Thank you, Victoria Nuland and the US, for that. The Washington Post reported that “Since 2015, the CIA has spent tens of millions of dollars to transform Ukraine’s Soviet-formed services into potent allies against Moscow.” To piss off Russia further the spelling of Kiev was changed to Kyiv to resemble Ukrainian spelling over Russian spelling, and to piss off restaurateurs worldwide who had to now change Chicken Kiev on their menus to Chicken Kyiv. In 2019, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church severed from the Russian Orthodox Church as the far right gained more and more control. Did you know that Zelensky ran on a platform to restore normal relations with Russia in 2019? After being elected, serious Ukrainian right death threats against Zelensky appeared and Zelensky soon caved to them because his pro-Russian stance also kept away US protection for him. The far right also branded the Minsk 2 agreement as treason, and by 2020 it comprised 40% of the entire Ukrainian armed forces – but no problem, as who doesn’t like placating fascists?
George Soros in 1993 advocated using Ukrainians in a proxy war against Russia. Imagine Rachel Maddow telling you that or giving her viewers the full backstory of the Ukrainian Civil War of 2014-2022. The Ukraine war is not just a proxy war but is “the main frontline in the struggle for the future world order”. The US is trying to “revive its weakening position in the world and restore its collective hegemony under US leadership.” “A defeat in Ukraine would discredit NATO in Europe and intensify the emergence of a multipolar world.” “Irrespective of the outcome of the war, the unipolar world order has come to an end.” Power has shifted from the West to the East to a Eurasian world order. Russia’s railways will replace the West’s historical success with ships “as the successor to Mongolian nomads” and the old Silk Roads. Remember that Mackinder considered Russia’s development of railways to be huge in controlling vast space and creating land power in Euro-Asia. Russia has a long history of being denied “access to maritime corridors” while the Brits were pissed Russia was doing so well on just the land corridors, thus threatening the dominant maritime power. “Suddenly, it appeared that the military and economic imperative of controlling the world seas could be overturned.” And then West got its panties in a bunch because it was no problem for Russia recently to pivot East for “technologies, industries, transportation corridors and finance.”
The US can’t allow people to think Putin’s war was provoked, otherwise diplomacy would be in order, instead of fueling it with weapons. Instead, the US pushes the narrative that this is Putin’s dictatorial first step towards dominating Europe and then the world, therefore ANY peace overtures are merely Neville Chamberlin appeasement. Of course, those with thinking brains know that “if Russia or China sought to establish a military alliance with Mexico and place THEIR weaponry on the American border” we’d all be going bat shit crazy. The US sees the defeat or weakening of Russia as step one in defeating China (never mind that China holds $800 billion of US debt). A big point of this book is that the US won’t allow “a peaceful transition to a Westphalian world order.” Bullies don’t give up their power willingly. Will our future be “global hegemony or Westphalian multipolarity”? Will the West ever “recognize Russia’s legitimate security concerns”? Stay tuned…
John Mearsheimer saw NATO enlargement as totally behind Russia’s annexation of the Crimea in 2014; why would Russia ever want to see the Black Sea and its only warm water port turned into a NATO lake? Even neocon Robert Kagan agreed with Mearsheimer. Only if there were no NATO provocations could you claim Russian malice. In 2023, NATO Secretary general Jens Stoltenberg admitted, “So he (Putin) went to war to prevent NATO, more NATO, close to his borders”. If you can’t stop continuous bullying peacefully, what else do you do? Know that BRICS is “antihegemonic and not anti-Western”; its goal is a “multipolar system and not to assert an alternative collective dominance over the West.”
Post 2022 Invasion Peace Efforts: When the 2022 invasion happened, Zelensky agreed to discuss neutrality, but the US (spokesman Ned Price) rejected peace talks and EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said the war would be over in days w/o western military support. In March, Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett did the second peace talk, and Putin said the invasion would end if Zelensky stipulated that Ukraine would not join NATO. “However, Bennett argued that the West intervened and ‘blocked’ the peace agreement.” In the third effort, Turkey was the mediator and Zelensky offered neutrality (as confirmed by Fiona Hill) but Boris Johnson flew to Kiev to sabotage that agreement. In October 2022 Zelensky made it “illegal to hold negotiations with Putin.” Christ comes back from the dead and says, “Well, why not make peace?” Zelensky says, “Nah, I just made that illegal.” Putin originally invaded to “impose neutrality on Ukraine.”
The fun part of US proxy wars for liberals is when you can get other people you don’t care about to fight your wars and die for you (as in Ukraine), it’s what US General Keith Kellogg calls the “acme of professionalism”. Let’s fight to the last Ukrainian, folks. A long-term goal for both the UK and US “has been to prevent the economic integration of Germany and Russia as a rival pole of power.” After the US destroyed the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, Europe would have to buy much more expensive US energy. Mission Accomplished! Sy Hersh showed the US and Norway “had attacked the pipelines.” For the wildlife in the area, of course, it was environmental terrorism.
Sanctions: “By November 2022, Russia had become India’s leading oil supplier.” So much for US sanctions. Oops… And don’t forget that around 85% of the world’s population live in countries that neither sent weapons to Ukraine, nor imposed sanctions on Russia.
This was a terrific book and kicked the ass out of the recent book “Hubris” but I also really liked the Scott Horton book “Provoked”. Anyway, as you can see, I learned a lot from it, and you will too. Kudos to Glenn…
After the Napoleonic War there were eight powers that seemingly mattered: Great Britain, France, Russia, Austria, Prussia, Spain, Portugal, and Sweden. It was hard to be a major dick when you were one of those eight since you still had to play well with others. But if you weren’t one of those eight countries, you had to go screw yourself as the rest of the world soon found out. Colonialism, anyone? This led to a Western-centric world order and “collective hegemony”. Racist Rudyard Kipling called it the garden versus the jungle.
“In 1871, Britain produced twice as much steel as Germany, but by 1893 German steel production surpassed British production (and by 1914 Germany produced twice the Brits)”. Too bad those two didn’t compete in cuisine; whoever goes to a German or British restaurant? We were taught about the Marshall Plan being about US post-war generosity, when it was about “removing protectionist measures against US industries”. To help that along, the IMF and World Bank were created, to make other countries formally beholden to the US – a role that ex-economic hitman John Perkins will tell you continues today.
In school we were taught the Cuban Missile Crisis was solved by the US acting heroically tough, when in fact it was solved by the US quietly removing its Jupiter missiles (pointed at the Soviet Union) from Turkey. Advance a few decades and “Henry Kissinger confirmed that Washington had deliberately placed unacceptable demands on Yugoslavia as ‘an excuse to start bombing’.” It was later acknowledged that “the war over Kosovo was primarily about geopolitical restructuring and not humanitarianism.”
Rules Based Order: The Westphalian thing died an ugly death when the US “systematically dismantled” international law since the 1990’s and replaced it with an “arbitrary rules based international order” where the US calls the shots like a Mafia don and others have to deal with it. “International law in accordance with the UN is based on the Westphalian principle of sovereign equality as ‘all states are equal’. In contrast, the rules based international order is a hegemonic system based on sovereign inequality, using international humanitarian law selectively” as the ever paranoid US sees fit.
Fun Facts: The head of the US “Committee to Expand NATO” Bruce Jackson is – wait for it – also the director of strategic planning for Lockheed Martin. Nothing to see here folks. “NATO expansion rejected the Westphalian balance of power, pursued sovereign inequality, enhanced its security at the expense of Russian security, and redivided the continent with a permanent peacetime military alliance.” Never expanding NATO eastward was promised to Russia by James Baker, George Bush, Hans-Dietrich Genscher, Helmut Kohl, Robert Gates, Francois Mitterand, Margaret Thatcher, Douglas Hurd, John Major, And Manfred Worner. The Twitter files “revealed that the Democratic Party cooperated with tech giants to censor its own citizens and the political opposition.” So much for the liberal notion that Democrats are always the good guys.
Color Revolutions: A Washington Post reporter said the NED was the “sugar daddy of overt operations” when you wanted to overthrow governments under the guise of “democracy promotion” and peddle propaganda recast as “information.” An NED (it’s an NGO) co-founder said, “Alot of what we do today was done covertly 25 years ago by the CIA.” If you did your nasty actions out in the open you could no longer be accused being secret about it and thus further tainting the CIA. The key was keeping a perceived distance of the NED from the CIA, which could “undermine NED’s credibility.” All this led to the US financed “color” revolutions in Serbia in 2000, Georgia 2003, Kyrgyzstan 2005, and Ukraine 2004 and 2014.
Ukrainian Yin Yang: Ukraine has two national identities, the eastern portion sympathetic to Russia (20% of all Ukrainians are ethnic Russians) and the western nationalists and kids of those who fought with the Nazis in WWII (now Azov, Right Sector, C14, Svoboda). Every May 9th, in Ukraine, many mourn Soviet victory in WWII in the west, while in the east many celebrate the victory of the Soviets, and some in the middle of Ukraine merely go drinking w/o knowing why. The US historically preferred Ukrainian nationalists and fascists because they were anti-Russian, and anti-communist – easier to buy their allegiance. “The west speaks Ukrainian, the east speaks mostly Russian. Clearly Ukraine must follow the Certs Paradigm and thus be both a breath mint and a candy mint – two mints in one. So opposite is western from eastern Ukraine that Ukrainian neutrality is the only intelligent way forward for Ukrainian solidarity and keep it from civil war. Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022 largely because it had zero assurances of Ukrainian neutrality. No blue and yellow flag waving liberal will tell you that “Between 1991 and 2014, the majority of Ukrainians had very favorable views of Russia and negative views of NATO.”
The US-financed 2004 Orange Revolution brought to power anti-Russian president Yushchenko and US financed NGOs with their expensive 24/7 pro-NATO and anti-Russia propaganda. The Guardian even wrote that the Orange Revolution was “an American creation” involving western branding and mass marketing”. A second Guardian article called it a “post-modern coup d’etat” and a “CIA-sponsored third world uprising of Cold War days, adapted to post-Soviet conditions.” Picture all this money flowing into Ukraine after 2004 to counter the fact that 43% of Ukrainians saw NATO as a threat. By the time of the 2008 Gallup poll, still little had changed with Ukrainians involving NATO. Yushchenko was “deeply unpopular” and Newsweek said he had a 2.7% approval rating at the end of his term. A big problem was that Ukraine’s strongest growth was before he took office when “most of Ukraine’s exports went to Russia and the CIS countries.” The dislike of anti-Russian policies led to Yanukovich being elected in 2010 “which the OSCE confirmed was a free and fair election.” Yanukovich in 2010 approved a bill declaring neutrality of Ukraine which formally kept NATO at bay – had that remained, Russia would never have invaded Ukraine.
Then in 2014 a leaked phone call showed Victoria Nuland of the US boldly plotting regime change with the US ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey Pyatt, when Yanukovich was still legally president. He was then removed and “the allegations of Yanukovich being corrupt were undoubtedly correct, but then so were his predecessors and successors.” Destabilizing Ukraine was quickly rebranded by NGOs as “helping” and “standing with Ukraine.” In March 2014, Foreign Policy ran an article stating, “The uncomfortable truth is that a sizeable portion of Kiev’s current government – and the protestors who brought it to power – are, indeed, fascists.” “The BBC reported that after the (2014) coup, Kiev’s city council was covered in large neo-Nazi banners, the American confederate flag, and portraits of the fascist ally of Hitler, Stepan Bandera.” Nazi whitewashing became commonplace. The first act was repealing Russian as a regional language. “In 2015, the US Congress recognized the Azov battalion as a Nazi organization and subsequently banned US military assistance to the group.” Before you get excited about that, know the US a year later removed the ban on funding Nazis. What were we thinking? Nazis gave us Hugo Boss and the racial rationale for taking land away from Palestinians! “In November 2021, the US and Ukraine were the ONLY two countries in the world to vote against the resolution combatting the glorification of Nazism.” Pause to wave the Ukrainian flag…
Did you know that Crimea has been the home of the Russian Black Sea fleet since 1783? “For two hundred years, since the time of Peter the Great, Russia has attempted to break through the encircling ring of border states and reach the ocean.” Russia saw that the 2014 coup was about NATO’s creep eastward and it then retook Crimea to keep access to its only warm water port. This was a violation of the UN Charter and a breach of the Budapest Memorandum. But “NATO’s Deputy Secretary-General acknowledged in July 2022 that the war in Ukraine is mostly about control over the Black Sea.” More stuff Rachel Maddow will never tell you, let alone that US supported pro-coup protestors burnt down a building in Odessa burning dozens of people to death, and shot people jumping out of the windows or beat them to death on the pavement (p.186). Beating your own countrymen to death merely because you disagree with them, so honorable.
To cool things down, in 2015 the Minsk 2 agreement was signed by Kiev. The US signed on and the UN voted yes to it to make it legal. Western powers immediately set to “undermining it.” NATO’s Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said in 2023 that “the war didn’t start in February last year. The war started in 2014.” Thank you, Victoria Nuland and the US, for that. The Washington Post reported that “Since 2015, the CIA has spent tens of millions of dollars to transform Ukraine’s Soviet-formed services into potent allies against Moscow.” To piss off Russia further the spelling of Kiev was changed to Kyiv to resemble Ukrainian spelling over Russian spelling, and to piss off restaurateurs worldwide who had to now change Chicken Kiev on their menus to Chicken Kyiv. In 2019, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church severed from the Russian Orthodox Church as the far right gained more and more control. Did you know that Zelensky ran on a platform to restore normal relations with Russia in 2019? After being elected, serious Ukrainian right death threats against Zelensky appeared and Zelensky soon caved to them because his pro-Russian stance also kept away US protection for him. The far right also branded the Minsk 2 agreement as treason, and by 2020 it comprised 40% of the entire Ukrainian armed forces – but no problem, as who doesn’t like placating fascists?
George Soros in 1993 advocated using Ukrainians in a proxy war against Russia. Imagine Rachel Maddow telling you that or giving her viewers the full backstory of the Ukrainian Civil War of 2014-2022. The Ukraine war is not just a proxy war but is “the main frontline in the struggle for the future world order”. The US is trying to “revive its weakening position in the world and restore its collective hegemony under US leadership.” “A defeat in Ukraine would discredit NATO in Europe and intensify the emergence of a multipolar world.” “Irrespective of the outcome of the war, the unipolar world order has come to an end.” Power has shifted from the West to the East to a Eurasian world order. Russia’s railways will replace the West’s historical success with ships “as the successor to Mongolian nomads” and the old Silk Roads. Remember that Mackinder considered Russia’s development of railways to be huge in controlling vast space and creating land power in Euro-Asia. Russia has a long history of being denied “access to maritime corridors” while the Brits were pissed Russia was doing so well on just the land corridors, thus threatening the dominant maritime power. “Suddenly, it appeared that the military and economic imperative of controlling the world seas could be overturned.” And then West got its panties in a bunch because it was no problem for Russia recently to pivot East for “technologies, industries, transportation corridors and finance.”
The US can’t allow people to think Putin’s war was provoked, otherwise diplomacy would be in order, instead of fueling it with weapons. Instead, the US pushes the narrative that this is Putin’s dictatorial first step towards dominating Europe and then the world, therefore ANY peace overtures are merely Neville Chamberlin appeasement. Of course, those with thinking brains know that “if Russia or China sought to establish a military alliance with Mexico and place THEIR weaponry on the American border” we’d all be going bat shit crazy. The US sees the defeat or weakening of Russia as step one in defeating China (never mind that China holds $800 billion of US debt). A big point of this book is that the US won’t allow “a peaceful transition to a Westphalian world order.” Bullies don’t give up their power willingly. Will our future be “global hegemony or Westphalian multipolarity”? Will the West ever “recognize Russia’s legitimate security concerns”? Stay tuned…
John Mearsheimer saw NATO enlargement as totally behind Russia’s annexation of the Crimea in 2014; why would Russia ever want to see the Black Sea and its only warm water port turned into a NATO lake? Even neocon Robert Kagan agreed with Mearsheimer. Only if there were no NATO provocations could you claim Russian malice. In 2023, NATO Secretary general Jens Stoltenberg admitted, “So he (Putin) went to war to prevent NATO, more NATO, close to his borders”. If you can’t stop continuous bullying peacefully, what else do you do? Know that BRICS is “antihegemonic and not anti-Western”; its goal is a “multipolar system and not to assert an alternative collective dominance over the West.”
Post 2022 Invasion Peace Efforts: When the 2022 invasion happened, Zelensky agreed to discuss neutrality, but the US (spokesman Ned Price) rejected peace talks and EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said the war would be over in days w/o western military support. In March, Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett did the second peace talk, and Putin said the invasion would end if Zelensky stipulated that Ukraine would not join NATO. “However, Bennett argued that the West intervened and ‘blocked’ the peace agreement.” In the third effort, Turkey was the mediator and Zelensky offered neutrality (as confirmed by Fiona Hill) but Boris Johnson flew to Kiev to sabotage that agreement. In October 2022 Zelensky made it “illegal to hold negotiations with Putin.” Christ comes back from the dead and says, “Well, why not make peace?” Zelensky says, “Nah, I just made that illegal.” Putin originally invaded to “impose neutrality on Ukraine.”
The fun part of US proxy wars for liberals is when you can get other people you don’t care about to fight your wars and die for you (as in Ukraine), it’s what US General Keith Kellogg calls the “acme of professionalism”. Let’s fight to the last Ukrainian, folks. A long-term goal for both the UK and US “has been to prevent the economic integration of Germany and Russia as a rival pole of power.” After the US destroyed the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, Europe would have to buy much more expensive US energy. Mission Accomplished! Sy Hersh showed the US and Norway “had attacked the pipelines.” For the wildlife in the area, of course, it was environmental terrorism.
Sanctions: “By November 2022, Russia had become India’s leading oil supplier.” So much for US sanctions. Oops… And don’t forget that around 85% of the world’s population live in countries that neither sent weapons to Ukraine, nor imposed sanctions on Russia.
This was a terrific book and kicked the ass out of the recent book “Hubris” but I also really liked the Scott Horton book “Provoked”. Anyway, as you can see, I learned a lot from it, and you will too. Kudos to Glenn…
May 5, 2024
Surely, the seminal academic/intellectual/erudite text on the concept, history and manifestations of “World Order”.
“A world order outlines the system and rules for how to live peacefully on the same planet, and a conflict over defining that world order suggests that the present order is suspended and chaos governs. Failing to reform the world order through diplomacy and peaceful mechanisms puts the new world on the path to being born through war.”
We still live under a U.S. maintained Western World Order, born in the 20th Century, and currently challenged by Russia and China. As Professor Diesen puts it, “The transition from a unipolar to a multipolar world order is spearheaded by the Eurasian giants of Russia and China, while it is seemingly supported by states representing a majority of the world’s population. The objective is to return to a balance of power in which the competing national interests of the great powers are addressed, and common rules cannot be imposed unilaterally with claims of universalism. Perceiving that a world order based on hegemony and liberalism is imperative for its national security, the U.S. has resisted multipolar realities that manifest themselves economically, politically, and militarily.”
We are indeed at the threshold of a new world: “Universalism has been incentivized by the concentration of power in the West, which meant the Westernization of the world. As power and the ability to influence continue to shift from the West to the East, the West will have an incentive to revive the idea of preserving civilizational distinctiveness. (…) Universalism, if realized, would result in a sharp decline of the complexity of the global society as a whole and the international system in particular. Reducing complexity, in turn, would dramatically increase the level of systemic risks and challenges.” The book is a fantastic contribution to understanding what is at stake and identifying the dangers we face. It is very deep and exhaustive, with extremely well sourced and fundamented reasonings and the trappings of demanding academic textbooks.
Some choice cuts.
“Fyodor Dostoyevsky (…) argued in 1873 that Russia could not contribute anything of value to the world if it merely emulated the West: ‘Embarrassed and afraid that we have fallen so far behind Europe in our intellectual and scientific development, we have forgotten that we ourselves, in the depth and tasks of the Russian soul, contain in ourselves as Russians the capacity perhaps to bring new light to the world, on the condition that our development is independent.’”
“The U.S. conflict with Russia and China threatens to make the entire world a chessboard for geopolitics. The U.S. has been unwilling to accommodate either Russia or China in a multipolar world order, and instead aims to weaken both. NATO expansionism is the key U.S. instrument for weakening Russia, while it seeks to weaken China by abandoning the One-China Policy by pushing for Taiwan’s secession. The Ukrainian War has intensified the transition to a multipolar Eurasian World Order. While Washington offers allies the opportunity to weaken a common adversary, the price for the allies is to cede some sovereignty to the U.S. such as control over foreign policy.”
“The U.S. has a greater ability to subordinate the Europeans during conflicts as security dependence can be converted to economic and political loyalty. However, Washington’s pressure to decouple Europe from Russia, China, Iran, and other adversaries of the U.S. will fuel animosity as the Europeans become increasingly irrelevant as an appendage of the U.S. If the Ukrainian War is fought to the last Ukrainian, then it will also be fought to the last Euro. Germany, the economic powerhouse of Europe, exemplified the humiliating subordination to the U.S. The German political media elites remained largely silent about the attack on its critical energy infrastructure, even more so when it became evident that Russia was not responsible. While Russia was able to divert its energy exports to the East, the Europeans suffered from de-industrialization and economic crisis.”
“The Singaporean diplomat and former president of the UN Security Council, Kishore Mahbubani, remarked that most people in the world desire to live in a multipolar world, which is why they oppose sanctions against Russia. A Western victory over Russia risks a return to Western hubris and unipolar ambitions, thus Mahbubani argued “a Russian defeat would not be in the interests of the Global South” as they want to live in a multipolar world: “Many countries in the South who still retain memories of the once-dominant West know the West will once again become arrogant and insufferable if it defeats Russia completely.”
“The rule of law was seemingly suspended as Russians saw their assets frozen without due process. Furthermore, Western states also threatened secondary sanctions against states that did not abide by the West’s unilateral sanctions. The aggressive efforts to deprive other states of their sovereignty and independent foreign policy were not limited to economic sanctions. Case in point, leaked cables revealed that U.S. diplomats were angered by Pakistan’s “aggressive neutrality” over the war in Ukraine and threatened Pakistan with “isolation” if Prime Minister Imran Khan remained in power. Washington therefore pressed for the removal of Pakistan’s democratically elected Prime Minister as he failed to toe the line, thereby destabilizing a nuclear power.”
“At the onset of the war, Russia’s export of crude oil to India was minimal, but by November 2022, Russia had become India’s leading oil supplier. The systemic incentives for a balanced multipolar Eurasia manifested itself in the International North-South Transportation Corridor (INSTC) linking Russia, Iran, and India, which also enhanced cooperation in technologies, industry, and finance. The north-south format is an initiative that ensures Eurasian connectivity does not become excessively China-centric without becoming an anti-China initiative. India and Russia are even contemplating the construction of oil tankers and the development of energy insurance companies to permanently immunize themselves from the West’s economic coercion.”
“Despite its purported support for Taiwan, in Washington, plans to destroy Taiwan’s largest chip manufacturer TSMC are openly discussed, to prevent the semiconductor factories from falling into China’s hands in the event of a possible invasion. Taiwan’s Defense Minister, Chiu Kuo-Cheng, warned the Americans that Taiwan would not accept an American attack on its strategic industries. While the threat to attack Taiwan’s industries is not official U.S. policy, it is nonetheless a reminder of the potential cost of excessive dependence on a declining hegemon. The U.S. seeks to organize the East-Asia region into a U.S.-led alliance, which would replicate Australia’s transition into a U.S. ally against China. For years, consecutive Australian Prime Ministers have insisted that Australia would not choose between the U.S. and China. Nonetheless, through the usual U.S. incrementalism, Australia became a frontline state against China, and Beijing began to respond.”
“The evolution and expansion of the BRICS grouping to 11 members in August 2023 was a clear signal that multipolar realities will assert themselves even against the fierce opposition of the West. The West’s unilateral sanctions that weaponize dependence on Western technologies, currencies, international payment systems, and insurance systems caused economic pain across the world and diminished food security. Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa already had a greater GDP than the G7 in terms of purchasing power parity (PPP) before the expansion. By creating alternatives to the Western-centric international economic system, the BRICS has turned economic coercion by the West into its surrender of its market share. BRICS expansion by admitting Saudi Arabia, Iran, Ethiopia, Egypt, Argentina, and the United Arab Emirates further accelerated a new world order. With a list of over 40 countries that want to join BRICS as a non-Western institution to introduce multipolarity, it will be difficult to reorganize the world back under the hegemony of the collective West. BRICS+ is anti-hegemonic and not anti-Western; the objective is to create a multipolar system and not to assert an alternative collective dominance over the West. Unlike the U.S.-led alliance systems that divide countries into weakened adversaries and obedient allies, the BRICS grouping pursues security with other members rather than against non-members. Case in point, both Saudi Arabia and Iran joined to mitigate their rivalry in the region, and both Egypt and Ethiopia joined who have disputes over the Nile River. BRICS thus demonstrates some qualitative differences from the imperial alliance system of divide and conquer.”
“China embraces economic nationalist policies akin to Alexander Hamilton and Friedrich List, and a conservative Confucianist philosophy to preserve traditional values and civilizational distinctiveness as the foundation of its nation-building. While communists seek to uproot and transcend history, conservatives use shared history as an anchor of domestic cohesion. China’s Foreign Minister, Wang Yi argued: ‘The unique features of China’s diplomacy originate in the rich and profound Chinese civilization… the idea of peace as of paramount importance and harmony without uniformity, as well as the personal conduct of treating others in a way that you would like to be treated, and helping others succeed in the same spirit as you would want to succeed yourself. These traditional values with a unique oriental touch provide an endless source of invaluable cultural asset for China’s diplomacy.’”
“Confucianism supports conservative ideas devoted to preserving the group, such as social integration, stability and harmonious relationships, require respect for tradition and social hierarchy. Confucian values have a wider appeal in East Asia as they are also found in states such as Japan and Korea. The rapid and disruptive economic developments in China over the past decades created a demand for tradition as an anchor of stability, thus Confucianism ensures that morality and harmony are not lost on the path to modernity. While China and other states in Asia become more liberal, their governments tend to embrace conservative policies to strengthen the group to maintain a balance. (…) As liberal hegemony continues to falter, there is a risk that the world will descend into conflict and competition for global dominance. The idea of replacing U.S. hegemony with Chinese hegemony is unlikely to unify a world community that aspires to multipolarity. China’s Global Civilization Initiative can be considered an effort to reassure and reorganize the world towards multipolarity. Universalism lends support to hegemonic ideologies, while the call for respecting civilizational distinctiveness strengthens the foundation for sovereign equality as a key component of a multipolar Westphalian system.”
(N.B.: “The collapse of the Holy Roman Empire gave birth to the modern world order manifested in the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, which was based on a balance of power among sovereign states. This order lasted for 150 years”)
“Russian efforts to diversify its economic connectivity in Greater Eurasia have not been opposed by Beijing, which has made Moscow more comfortable with China’s economic leadership in the region. This represents a very different approach from the hegemonic model of Washington’s divide-and-rule strategy, in which the U.S. attempts to decouple economic partnerships between Russia, Germany, China, India, Turkey, Iran, Central Asia, and others. (…) Russia embraces conservatism, seeing its distinctive thousand-year history as the source of unity and sets the conditions for a unique path to modernity.”
“President Putin outlined Eurasian integration as an initiative to support civilizational diversity: ‘I want to stress that Eurasian integration will also be built on the principle of diversity. This is a union where everyone maintains their identity, their distinctive character, and their political independence… We expect that it will become our common input into maintaining diversity and stable global development.’”
“It can be concluded that restoring a Westphalian world order not only requires a multipolar distribution of economic power, it also demands respect for civilizational diversity to ensure that the principle of indivisible security is preserved. (…) The new Westphalia can, for the first time, truly be a world order by including non-Western nations as sovereign equals, which is already the foundation for equality under international law according to the United Nations Charter. One should therefore not be surprised by the positive response from the majority of the world to the proposal of replacing intrusive bullying with cooperation based on equality and mutual respect. (…) After enjoying hegemony for five centuries and constructing and imposing global rules to serve Western interests, there is now a spectacular realignment of power in the world. The global majority seeks multipolarity in accordance with a Westphalian world order, while the West, under Washington’s leadership, attempts to restore its dominant position in the world. (…) A traumatic experience is awaiting the West as it must adjust to a multipolar international distribution of power and rules that are seen to be set or influenced by non-Western powers. However, it does not appear that the U.S. will accept a peaceful transition to a Westphalian world order. The absence of political imagination in Washington has produced a world view in which chaos is the only alternative to U.S. global dominance. (…) Viewing the world as divided between good and evil, Blinken insisted that “Beijing and Moscow are working together to make the world safe for autocracy.” Rather than envisioning a transition to a balanced multipolar Westphalian world order, Blinken envisioned a struggle against both China and Russia under America’s global leadership. If this continues to be the view of the West, we will witness a great tragedy for humankind.”
“A world order outlines the system and rules for how to live peacefully on the same planet, and a conflict over defining that world order suggests that the present order is suspended and chaos governs. Failing to reform the world order through diplomacy and peaceful mechanisms puts the new world on the path to being born through war.”
We still live under a U.S. maintained Western World Order, born in the 20th Century, and currently challenged by Russia and China. As Professor Diesen puts it, “The transition from a unipolar to a multipolar world order is spearheaded by the Eurasian giants of Russia and China, while it is seemingly supported by states representing a majority of the world’s population. The objective is to return to a balance of power in which the competing national interests of the great powers are addressed, and common rules cannot be imposed unilaterally with claims of universalism. Perceiving that a world order based on hegemony and liberalism is imperative for its national security, the U.S. has resisted multipolar realities that manifest themselves economically, politically, and militarily.”
We are indeed at the threshold of a new world: “Universalism has been incentivized by the concentration of power in the West, which meant the Westernization of the world. As power and the ability to influence continue to shift from the West to the East, the West will have an incentive to revive the idea of preserving civilizational distinctiveness. (…) Universalism, if realized, would result in a sharp decline of the complexity of the global society as a whole and the international system in particular. Reducing complexity, in turn, would dramatically increase the level of systemic risks and challenges.” The book is a fantastic contribution to understanding what is at stake and identifying the dangers we face. It is very deep and exhaustive, with extremely well sourced and fundamented reasonings and the trappings of demanding academic textbooks.
Some choice cuts.
“Fyodor Dostoyevsky (…) argued in 1873 that Russia could not contribute anything of value to the world if it merely emulated the West: ‘Embarrassed and afraid that we have fallen so far behind Europe in our intellectual and scientific development, we have forgotten that we ourselves, in the depth and tasks of the Russian soul, contain in ourselves as Russians the capacity perhaps to bring new light to the world, on the condition that our development is independent.’”
“The U.S. conflict with Russia and China threatens to make the entire world a chessboard for geopolitics. The U.S. has been unwilling to accommodate either Russia or China in a multipolar world order, and instead aims to weaken both. NATO expansionism is the key U.S. instrument for weakening Russia, while it seeks to weaken China by abandoning the One-China Policy by pushing for Taiwan’s secession. The Ukrainian War has intensified the transition to a multipolar Eurasian World Order. While Washington offers allies the opportunity to weaken a common adversary, the price for the allies is to cede some sovereignty to the U.S. such as control over foreign policy.”
“The U.S. has a greater ability to subordinate the Europeans during conflicts as security dependence can be converted to economic and political loyalty. However, Washington’s pressure to decouple Europe from Russia, China, Iran, and other adversaries of the U.S. will fuel animosity as the Europeans become increasingly irrelevant as an appendage of the U.S. If the Ukrainian War is fought to the last Ukrainian, then it will also be fought to the last Euro. Germany, the economic powerhouse of Europe, exemplified the humiliating subordination to the U.S. The German political media elites remained largely silent about the attack on its critical energy infrastructure, even more so when it became evident that Russia was not responsible. While Russia was able to divert its energy exports to the East, the Europeans suffered from de-industrialization and economic crisis.”
“The Singaporean diplomat and former president of the UN Security Council, Kishore Mahbubani, remarked that most people in the world desire to live in a multipolar world, which is why they oppose sanctions against Russia. A Western victory over Russia risks a return to Western hubris and unipolar ambitions, thus Mahbubani argued “a Russian defeat would not be in the interests of the Global South” as they want to live in a multipolar world: “Many countries in the South who still retain memories of the once-dominant West know the West will once again become arrogant and insufferable if it defeats Russia completely.”
“The rule of law was seemingly suspended as Russians saw their assets frozen without due process. Furthermore, Western states also threatened secondary sanctions against states that did not abide by the West’s unilateral sanctions. The aggressive efforts to deprive other states of their sovereignty and independent foreign policy were not limited to economic sanctions. Case in point, leaked cables revealed that U.S. diplomats were angered by Pakistan’s “aggressive neutrality” over the war in Ukraine and threatened Pakistan with “isolation” if Prime Minister Imran Khan remained in power. Washington therefore pressed for the removal of Pakistan’s democratically elected Prime Minister as he failed to toe the line, thereby destabilizing a nuclear power.”
“At the onset of the war, Russia’s export of crude oil to India was minimal, but by November 2022, Russia had become India’s leading oil supplier. The systemic incentives for a balanced multipolar Eurasia manifested itself in the International North-South Transportation Corridor (INSTC) linking Russia, Iran, and India, which also enhanced cooperation in technologies, industry, and finance. The north-south format is an initiative that ensures Eurasian connectivity does not become excessively China-centric without becoming an anti-China initiative. India and Russia are even contemplating the construction of oil tankers and the development of energy insurance companies to permanently immunize themselves from the West’s economic coercion.”
“Despite its purported support for Taiwan, in Washington, plans to destroy Taiwan’s largest chip manufacturer TSMC are openly discussed, to prevent the semiconductor factories from falling into China’s hands in the event of a possible invasion. Taiwan’s Defense Minister, Chiu Kuo-Cheng, warned the Americans that Taiwan would not accept an American attack on its strategic industries. While the threat to attack Taiwan’s industries is not official U.S. policy, it is nonetheless a reminder of the potential cost of excessive dependence on a declining hegemon. The U.S. seeks to organize the East-Asia region into a U.S.-led alliance, which would replicate Australia’s transition into a U.S. ally against China. For years, consecutive Australian Prime Ministers have insisted that Australia would not choose between the U.S. and China. Nonetheless, through the usual U.S. incrementalism, Australia became a frontline state against China, and Beijing began to respond.”
“The evolution and expansion of the BRICS grouping to 11 members in August 2023 was a clear signal that multipolar realities will assert themselves even against the fierce opposition of the West. The West’s unilateral sanctions that weaponize dependence on Western technologies, currencies, international payment systems, and insurance systems caused economic pain across the world and diminished food security. Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa already had a greater GDP than the G7 in terms of purchasing power parity (PPP) before the expansion. By creating alternatives to the Western-centric international economic system, the BRICS has turned economic coercion by the West into its surrender of its market share. BRICS expansion by admitting Saudi Arabia, Iran, Ethiopia, Egypt, Argentina, and the United Arab Emirates further accelerated a new world order. With a list of over 40 countries that want to join BRICS as a non-Western institution to introduce multipolarity, it will be difficult to reorganize the world back under the hegemony of the collective West. BRICS+ is anti-hegemonic and not anti-Western; the objective is to create a multipolar system and not to assert an alternative collective dominance over the West. Unlike the U.S.-led alliance systems that divide countries into weakened adversaries and obedient allies, the BRICS grouping pursues security with other members rather than against non-members. Case in point, both Saudi Arabia and Iran joined to mitigate their rivalry in the region, and both Egypt and Ethiopia joined who have disputes over the Nile River. BRICS thus demonstrates some qualitative differences from the imperial alliance system of divide and conquer.”
“China embraces economic nationalist policies akin to Alexander Hamilton and Friedrich List, and a conservative Confucianist philosophy to preserve traditional values and civilizational distinctiveness as the foundation of its nation-building. While communists seek to uproot and transcend history, conservatives use shared history as an anchor of domestic cohesion. China’s Foreign Minister, Wang Yi argued: ‘The unique features of China’s diplomacy originate in the rich and profound Chinese civilization… the idea of peace as of paramount importance and harmony without uniformity, as well as the personal conduct of treating others in a way that you would like to be treated, and helping others succeed in the same spirit as you would want to succeed yourself. These traditional values with a unique oriental touch provide an endless source of invaluable cultural asset for China’s diplomacy.’”
“Confucianism supports conservative ideas devoted to preserving the group, such as social integration, stability and harmonious relationships, require respect for tradition and social hierarchy. Confucian values have a wider appeal in East Asia as they are also found in states such as Japan and Korea. The rapid and disruptive economic developments in China over the past decades created a demand for tradition as an anchor of stability, thus Confucianism ensures that morality and harmony are not lost on the path to modernity. While China and other states in Asia become more liberal, their governments tend to embrace conservative policies to strengthen the group to maintain a balance. (…) As liberal hegemony continues to falter, there is a risk that the world will descend into conflict and competition for global dominance. The idea of replacing U.S. hegemony with Chinese hegemony is unlikely to unify a world community that aspires to multipolarity. China’s Global Civilization Initiative can be considered an effort to reassure and reorganize the world towards multipolarity. Universalism lends support to hegemonic ideologies, while the call for respecting civilizational distinctiveness strengthens the foundation for sovereign equality as a key component of a multipolar Westphalian system.”
(N.B.: “The collapse of the Holy Roman Empire gave birth to the modern world order manifested in the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, which was based on a balance of power among sovereign states. This order lasted for 150 years”)
“Russian efforts to diversify its economic connectivity in Greater Eurasia have not been opposed by Beijing, which has made Moscow more comfortable with China’s economic leadership in the region. This represents a very different approach from the hegemonic model of Washington’s divide-and-rule strategy, in which the U.S. attempts to decouple economic partnerships between Russia, Germany, China, India, Turkey, Iran, Central Asia, and others. (…) Russia embraces conservatism, seeing its distinctive thousand-year history as the source of unity and sets the conditions for a unique path to modernity.”
“President Putin outlined Eurasian integration as an initiative to support civilizational diversity: ‘I want to stress that Eurasian integration will also be built on the principle of diversity. This is a union where everyone maintains their identity, their distinctive character, and their political independence… We expect that it will become our common input into maintaining diversity and stable global development.’”
“It can be concluded that restoring a Westphalian world order not only requires a multipolar distribution of economic power, it also demands respect for civilizational diversity to ensure that the principle of indivisible security is preserved. (…) The new Westphalia can, for the first time, truly be a world order by including non-Western nations as sovereign equals, which is already the foundation for equality under international law according to the United Nations Charter. One should therefore not be surprised by the positive response from the majority of the world to the proposal of replacing intrusive bullying with cooperation based on equality and mutual respect. (…) After enjoying hegemony for five centuries and constructing and imposing global rules to serve Western interests, there is now a spectacular realignment of power in the world. The global majority seeks multipolarity in accordance with a Westphalian world order, while the West, under Washington’s leadership, attempts to restore its dominant position in the world. (…) A traumatic experience is awaiting the West as it must adjust to a multipolar international distribution of power and rules that are seen to be set or influenced by non-Western powers. However, it does not appear that the U.S. will accept a peaceful transition to a Westphalian world order. The absence of political imagination in Washington has produced a world view in which chaos is the only alternative to U.S. global dominance. (…) Viewing the world as divided between good and evil, Blinken insisted that “Beijing and Moscow are working together to make the world safe for autocracy.” Rather than envisioning a transition to a balanced multipolar Westphalian world order, Blinken envisioned a struggle against both China and Russia under America’s global leadership. If this continues to be the view of the West, we will witness a great tragedy for humankind.”
May 24, 2024
A very important book if you wish to free yourself from the straitjacket of western main stream media and find the reality of the geopolitics of this age, mainly advanced in this book by examination of the origin of the Russian - Ukrainian war. Those who follow media outlets like "The Duran" or "Mercouris" or "Judging Freedom" or "Scott Ritter" will already know much of this story, indeed Glenn regularly appears on "The Duran". However, this book fills in a lot of details you may have missed or forgotten about that proves beyond any shadow of a doubt whatsoever that the US/NATO role in provoking Russia to its "Special Military Operation" in Ukraine was and continues to be substantial.
Basically this has always been a challenge by the West on Putin and Russia, a dare, a throwing down of the gauntlet, as for instance the US inspired and supported coup in Ukraine in 2014, where the world's nastiest woman, Victoria Nuland, went about handing biscuits to crowds in the Maidan Square, whilst organising the new Ukrainian government to suit the US interests. As Mearsheimer puts it, the US leading Ukraine up the primrose path to ruin, with a promise it could never fill, but as long as it did something bad to Russia.
Diesen shows how this war was eminently avoidable, the three non-onerous things the west would have had to agree to being 1) that Crimear remains under Russian sovereignty (which is what 80% of its population want) 2) That Ukraine remain neutral and never part of NATO 3) a degree of autonomy to the Donbas and the removal of restrictions on the Russian language and culture in Ukraine as per the Minsk 2 agreement. and 4) the "denazification" of the military and politics in Ukraine.
I have been following this Ukraine war, which is actually a proxy war between NATO (ie the US) and Russia. If the west do not now admit that Ukraine and NATO are losing and come to some sort of agreement with Russia, and persist in the dangerous escalation of the west to try and resist the reality of this lost, we are looking at WW3 and the destruction of Europe and much of humanity.
Glenn takes time later in the book to examine the wider geopolitical issues vis a vis China and the rest of the world, He sees a possible return to what he calls a "Westphalian" world order - where independent states follow their own course on a more equal and peaceful basis, vs the "Unipolar" or hegemonic world order that the US is creating chaos in trying to maintain following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1989.
This book is well written and researched with copious reference and quoted sources. I just pray that this book isn't part of a requiem for our civilisation. Repeat, if you don't read this book and you haven[t been following the alternative news/media outlets, such as mentioned above, then everything you think you know about the Russian-Ukrainian war is a demonstrable lie and will bring us to ruination.
Basically this has always been a challenge by the West on Putin and Russia, a dare, a throwing down of the gauntlet, as for instance the US inspired and supported coup in Ukraine in 2014, where the world's nastiest woman, Victoria Nuland, went about handing biscuits to crowds in the Maidan Square, whilst organising the new Ukrainian government to suit the US interests. As Mearsheimer puts it, the US leading Ukraine up the primrose path to ruin, with a promise it could never fill, but as long as it did something bad to Russia.
Diesen shows how this war was eminently avoidable, the three non-onerous things the west would have had to agree to being 1) that Crimear remains under Russian sovereignty (which is what 80% of its population want) 2) That Ukraine remain neutral and never part of NATO 3) a degree of autonomy to the Donbas and the removal of restrictions on the Russian language and culture in Ukraine as per the Minsk 2 agreement. and 4) the "denazification" of the military and politics in Ukraine.
I have been following this Ukraine war, which is actually a proxy war between NATO (ie the US) and Russia. If the west do not now admit that Ukraine and NATO are losing and come to some sort of agreement with Russia, and persist in the dangerous escalation of the west to try and resist the reality of this lost, we are looking at WW3 and the destruction of Europe and much of humanity.
Glenn takes time later in the book to examine the wider geopolitical issues vis a vis China and the rest of the world, He sees a possible return to what he calls a "Westphalian" world order - where independent states follow their own course on a more equal and peaceful basis, vs the "Unipolar" or hegemonic world order that the US is creating chaos in trying to maintain following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1989.
This book is well written and researched with copious reference and quoted sources. I just pray that this book isn't part of a requiem for our civilisation. Repeat, if you don't read this book and you haven[t been following the alternative news/media outlets, such as mentioned above, then everything you think you know about the Russian-Ukrainian war is a demonstrable lie and will bring us to ruination.
May 13, 2024
This book is carefully written, like a legal position in a court case or an academic journal article. As a result, the first chapter is not easy reading, but once you get past that, the style settles down, and important and interesting facts are revealed.
Academic publications and Judicial systems focus on proven truth. This book is well written, researched and referenced, and I believe is an accurate history with relation to the recent events in Ukraine (if I get a chance to follow all references, then I will know this is true). It explains well the motivations by all concerned without bias, and also explains that we once had a sustainable solution in place for world peace.
I have read other books which focus on the narrative that Vladimir Putin is a mad man, and found that argument did not explain Russia's actions in Ukraine. This book does explain those actions. Leadership internationally should read and understand this book, as we are witnessing risk of a war that really will end all wars.
Academic publications and Judicial systems focus on proven truth. This book is well written, researched and referenced, and I believe is an accurate history with relation to the recent events in Ukraine (if I get a chance to follow all references, then I will know this is true). It explains well the motivations by all concerned without bias, and also explains that we once had a sustainable solution in place for world peace.
I have read other books which focus on the narrative that Vladimir Putin is a mad man, and found that argument did not explain Russia's actions in Ukraine. This book does explain those actions. Leadership internationally should read and understand this book, as we are witnessing risk of a war that really will end all wars.
March 17, 2025
Glenn Diesen has worked for RT and is actively spreading russian propaganda. Waste of time.
January 20, 2025
Brilliant. George Orwell, in his 1945 essay "Freedom of the Park" writes: "The degree of freedom of the press existing in this country is often overrated. Technically there is great freedom, but the fact that most of the press is owned by a few people operates in much the same way as State censorship.". This has not changed.
The Western reader of Glenn Diesen’s book is confronted with that uncomfortable truth by being exposed to an alien but well researched narrative about the world order that wholly undermines and even contradicts what most of us would see on the news or hear from our political leaders. We are assured that we are peace loving, law abiding, stabilizing, altruistic, and they are … the barbarians at the gate.
Without absolving Russia or China, Diesen draws from the political and diplomatic elite, incl. Jack Matlock, George Kennan, Condoleezza Rice, Henry Kissinger, Barack Obama, Mikhail Gorbachev, George HWB, and of course the primaries of the Russia-Ukraine war, among many others, to show how cunning, devious, and belligerent the west has been post ww2. Complemented by his own penetrating thoughts on the growing neo-westphalian order, Diesen’s book wipes away the muck and grime obscuring the view from within our glass house, allowing us to see clearly out into the world, past the gates, and hopefully in time, back towards ourselves.
The Western reader of Glenn Diesen’s book is confronted with that uncomfortable truth by being exposed to an alien but well researched narrative about the world order that wholly undermines and even contradicts what most of us would see on the news or hear from our political leaders. We are assured that we are peace loving, law abiding, stabilizing, altruistic, and they are … the barbarians at the gate.
Without absolving Russia or China, Diesen draws from the political and diplomatic elite, incl. Jack Matlock, George Kennan, Condoleezza Rice, Henry Kissinger, Barack Obama, Mikhail Gorbachev, George HWB, and of course the primaries of the Russia-Ukraine war, among many others, to show how cunning, devious, and belligerent the west has been post ww2. Complemented by his own penetrating thoughts on the growing neo-westphalian order, Diesen’s book wipes away the muck and grime obscuring the view from within our glass house, allowing us to see clearly out into the world, past the gates, and hopefully in time, back towards ourselves.
March 23, 2024
Essential reading for anyone who wants to understand more about the Ukraine war and the competing interests of the west and the global majority. There is a lot of detail in here, but the book really gets going in the second half once Diesen has laid all the groundwork for what he has to say.
January 27, 2025
Outstanding analysis of the causes of the war in Ukraine
This should be required reading for all students of foreign affairs and geopolitics. Well documented analysis of the real causes of the war and of overall US foreign policy. It is very disappointing that where we supposedly have a free press and top journalists that the US is able to spread false narratives about the war to suit their purposes. Very sad indeed.
This should be required reading for all students of foreign affairs and geopolitics. Well documented analysis of the real causes of the war and of overall US foreign policy. It is very disappointing that where we supposedly have a free press and top journalists that the US is able to spread false narratives about the war to suit their purposes. Very sad indeed.
March 17, 2024
Excellent overview of the American proxy war against Russia in, this time, Ukraine, from a geo-political point of view. Current events analysis at its best. Will keep reading this author.
September 22, 2024
The Ukraine War & the Eurasian World Order by Glenn Diesen, 2024, argues that the Ukraine War is largely due to American hegemony and manipulation of its allies, but that a new world order is emerging which will and must frustrate the liberal world order that has been emerging since the Age of Discovery in the 16th Century. It is to be a Westphalian Eurasian world order or nuclear war.
“Glenn Diesen is a professor at the University of South-eastern Norway (USN) and an associate editor at the Russia in Global Affairs journal. Diesen’s research focus is Russia’s transition from the Greater European Initiative to the Greater Eurasian Partnership…”
Contents: Introduction; The Modern Westphalian World Order: Power and legitimacy; the Rise of the Western-Centric World Order; Pax Americana: The New World order of Liberal Hegemony; Decline of the West and the Liberal World Order; NATO Expansion and the Collapse of the Pan-European Order; Ukraine as a Pawn in a Divided Europe: 1991-2014; The Ukrainian Civil War 2014-2022; The Russian Invasion of 2022; A Eurasian-Westphalian World Order; Conclusion: Interregnum—Transition, Uncertainty and Disorder; Bibliography; Index.
“Hegemony did not mitigate great power rivalry; instead, it enabled the dominant power to act without regard for others, replacing diplomacy with the language of ultimatums. What was sold to the public as ‘pro-Ukrainian’ policies and ‘helping Ukraine’ entailed toppling their democratically elected government without majority support from Ukrainians; supporting an ‘anti-terror operation’ against Ukrainians in the East; purging its political opposition and dismantling its democracy; empowering far-right militant groups; sabotaging peace agreements supported by Kiev; and pressuring the Ukrainian armed forces to launch a devastating counter-offensive that had little to no chance of succeeding…
A political solution to the war demands that NATO expansionism and the collapse of the pan-European security architecture be addressed as the underlying casus belli of the war…”
Having read about the American invasion and colonization of the Philippines, and watched a number of Filipino produced films about that era, the logic of American treachery and diplomatic ambiguity seems a historic pattern. But it is a logic resulting in lost blood, treasure, and little real gain, even for the United States, much less Liberal hegemony as a world order.
Is it really a choice between appeasement, resulting in future wars, or is there a chance of long-lasting peace and diversity of national systems living and thriving together. Our middle son died, largely because of that question, from his service with the U.S. Army in Baghdad. I thought I knew the answer once. But, I don’t.
“Glenn Diesen is a professor at the University of South-eastern Norway (USN) and an associate editor at the Russia in Global Affairs journal. Diesen’s research focus is Russia’s transition from the Greater European Initiative to the Greater Eurasian Partnership…”
Contents: Introduction; The Modern Westphalian World Order: Power and legitimacy; the Rise of the Western-Centric World Order; Pax Americana: The New World order of Liberal Hegemony; Decline of the West and the Liberal World Order; NATO Expansion and the Collapse of the Pan-European Order; Ukraine as a Pawn in a Divided Europe: 1991-2014; The Ukrainian Civil War 2014-2022; The Russian Invasion of 2022; A Eurasian-Westphalian World Order; Conclusion: Interregnum—Transition, Uncertainty and Disorder; Bibliography; Index.
“Hegemony did not mitigate great power rivalry; instead, it enabled the dominant power to act without regard for others, replacing diplomacy with the language of ultimatums. What was sold to the public as ‘pro-Ukrainian’ policies and ‘helping Ukraine’ entailed toppling their democratically elected government without majority support from Ukrainians; supporting an ‘anti-terror operation’ against Ukrainians in the East; purging its political opposition and dismantling its democracy; empowering far-right militant groups; sabotaging peace agreements supported by Kiev; and pressuring the Ukrainian armed forces to launch a devastating counter-offensive that had little to no chance of succeeding…
A political solution to the war demands that NATO expansionism and the collapse of the pan-European security architecture be addressed as the underlying casus belli of the war…”
Having read about the American invasion and colonization of the Philippines, and watched a number of Filipino produced films about that era, the logic of American treachery and diplomatic ambiguity seems a historic pattern. But it is a logic resulting in lost blood, treasure, and little real gain, even for the United States, much less Liberal hegemony as a world order.
Is it really a choice between appeasement, resulting in future wars, or is there a chance of long-lasting peace and diversity of national systems living and thriving together. Our middle son died, largely because of that question, from his service with the U.S. Army in Baghdad. I thought I knew the answer once. But, I don’t.
May 31, 2025
The shittiest book about the war. I would give it minus rating if possible.
Russian propaganda pieces translated + big part on Putins favourite Westfalian world order.
As usual for these propaganda books, they rely on three core pieces - missing or at least significantly minimising Russian and Soviet negative parts (wars, antisemitism, genocide), messing with timeline(pretending that Russian actions were responding to the actions that happened much later - ie fire in Odesa in May caused Russian occupation of Crimea in February and Russian special forces appearing in Donetsk region in April) and constant misquoting and adding completely wrong context.
Author as usual for propagandists omit Russian troops in Ukraine in 2014, MH17.
I couldn't physically write answer to points like I did for "War in Ukraine" by Medea Benjamin. This book is much more disgusting and does not even pretend that there is something to uncover, it lies constantly.
Here is the example. On page 202, yhe author writes that radical nationalists were forcing Ukraine to war and make reference to Reuters that "By 2020, the paramilitary militias in Ukraine constituted about 102000 men". The author continues with - These paramilitary organisations were infused heavily with nationalists from Western Ukraine and they were armed and trained by Western powers.
The number looks too exact to be invented, so I have decided to verify. There was a graphic that says that Ukraine had 102000 memebers in paramilitary and another graphic showing that Russia has several times more people in paramilitary. There's no mention of militias, which author invented to make their bullshit point. What are those paramilitary? Border control, national guard and other government controlled armed forces that were not part of the army.
One surprising thing in the book - author wrote it not only for lefties(USSR - good), but also for far right (AfD are just populists, Biden corruption).
Russian propaganda pieces translated + big part on Putins favourite Westfalian world order.
As usual for these propaganda books, they rely on three core pieces - missing or at least significantly minimising Russian and Soviet negative parts (wars, antisemitism, genocide), messing with timeline(pretending that Russian actions were responding to the actions that happened much later - ie fire in Odesa in May caused Russian occupation of Crimea in February and Russian special forces appearing in Donetsk region in April) and constant misquoting and adding completely wrong context.
Author as usual for propagandists omit Russian troops in Ukraine in 2014, MH17.
I couldn't physically write answer to points like I did for "War in Ukraine" by Medea Benjamin. This book is much more disgusting and does not even pretend that there is something to uncover, it lies constantly.
Here is the example. On page 202, yhe author writes that radical nationalists were forcing Ukraine to war and make reference to Reuters that "By 2020, the paramilitary militias in Ukraine constituted about 102000 men". The author continues with - These paramilitary organisations were infused heavily with nationalists from Western Ukraine and they were armed and trained by Western powers.
The number looks too exact to be invented, so I have decided to verify. There was a graphic that says that Ukraine had 102000 memebers in paramilitary and another graphic showing that Russia has several times more people in paramilitary. There's no mention of militias, which author invented to make their bullshit point. What are those paramilitary? Border control, national guard and other government controlled armed forces that were not part of the army.
One surprising thing in the book - author wrote it not only for lefties(USSR - good), but also for far right (AfD are just populists, Biden corruption).
May 31, 2025
Diesen has written a terrific book about the emerging world order. The multipolar system that is now forming, he argues, has the potential to be much more peaceful than the US-dominated unipolar moment that recently ended. But the Ukraine war, a legacy of American policy during unipolarity, has poisoned international politics and made it difficult to transition to a more harmonious Westphalian order. A must read for anyone who wants to understand the great shift in the global distribution of power that is taking place before our eyes.
John Mearsheimer
Brilliant, in-depth analysis of the roots of the Ukraine war and the emerging changes in the world order.
Jack F Matlock, Jr
U.S. Ambassador to the USSR 1987–1991
A wide-ranging and stimulating examination of contesting models of world order and the roots of the Russo-Ukrainian war. A corrective to mainstream Western narratives, providing a powerful conceptual framework for critique. A brilliant foundational work.
Richard Sakwa
What luck! Professor Diesen takes the role of Christopher, patron saint of travelers, as we stumble across the threshold into 2024 – a truly liminal year. With laudable candor, Diesen presents little-known facts – on Ukraine, for example – showing how we arrived at this dangerous juncture. If facts lead to action, we may yet survive the demise of the tottering hegemon of the West.
Ray McGovern
December 26, 2024
A very interesting book. A pertinent read for those interested in understanding better the current global situation. Glenn Diesen presents a detailed and precise overview of the contextual background of the current conflict in Ukraine from a realist's perspective. In this sense I found it useful and engaging and I am glad I took the time to read it. However, Diesen's prose certainly leaves a lot to be desired; I was able to overlook this because the content was so interesting, but it is undeniably presented in incredibly dry language. I also found Diesen's insistence on the re-emergence of a "Westphalian World Order" grating and, by the end, over done. The most distracting issue with this text, however, was the editing. There were many instances where it was obvious that two sentences had been combined and then promptly forgotten about, resulting in confusing and often unintelligible franken-sentences, leaving the reader to guess at the author's meaning. My final criticism is more personal, but there were just a few too many references to ideologues such as Solzhenitsyn and Arendt for my taste.
Overall, a very thoroughly researched and interesting book for those who want to better understand the context of the current conflict in Ukraine. 4 stars because I am of the opinion that the importance of this knowledge trumps any editing or other issues I had with the text.
Overall, a very thoroughly researched and interesting book for those who want to better understand the context of the current conflict in Ukraine. 4 stars because I am of the opinion that the importance of this knowledge trumps any editing or other issues I had with the text.
August 18, 2025
En bra och nykter analys ur den teoretiska allt mer sällsynta linsen av realism och realpolitik. Boken gör ett utmärkt jobb av att förklara de teoretiska och normativa skillnaderna mellan det jämlika Westfaliska systemet baserat på maktbalans, och det hegemoniska liberala systemet som strävar efter universialism den "ojämlika likheten" mellan civiliserade och barbarer, demokratier och autokratier, korrekta och felaktiga värderingar. I det anseendet tar boken sig en viktig plats i samtida Europa där idealismen i politiken för oss närmare kärnvapenkrig, och i bästa fall ruinerat världsdelen på både kapital och suveränitet i sitt underordnade åt ett desperat USA.
Författaren själv är konservativ och jag tycker även han faller kort på sin egna idealism av den multipolära världsordningen som eftersträvsamt slutmål. Att upphäva mellanstatliga konflikter genom en värld av "distinkta civilisationer" balanserade av respekten för varandras nationella säkerhetskalkyler är att bortse från att dessa konflikter i grunden inte är policybeslut, utan logiska följer av globalt ekonomiskt system baserat på konkurrens och profit.
I min mening underkänner dessa ideologiska skillnader dock inte alls bokens välgjorda teoretiska introduktioner och dess utmärkta analys av konfliktens decennier långa upptrappande och utlösning.
Författaren själv är konservativ och jag tycker även han faller kort på sin egna idealism av den multipolära världsordningen som eftersträvsamt slutmål. Att upphäva mellanstatliga konflikter genom en värld av "distinkta civilisationer" balanserade av respekten för varandras nationella säkerhetskalkyler är att bortse från att dessa konflikter i grunden inte är policybeslut, utan logiska följer av globalt ekonomiskt system baserat på konkurrens och profit.
I min mening underkänner dessa ideologiska skillnader dock inte alls bokens välgjorda teoretiska introduktioner och dess utmärkta analys av konfliktens decennier långa upptrappande och utlösning.
June 21, 2025
Essential reading for anyone concerned about the current state of international politics.
This great book delves into a topic far more expansive than its title implies, making it essential reading for anyone concerned about the current state of international politics.
The title may imply that the book focuses solely on the Ukraine War, but it offers much more than that. It skillfully places the conflict within a broader global framework, providing readers with remarkable clarity on the subject.
In essence, the book serves as a historical overview of world orders, tracing the evolution from early globalization through the post-World War II era to the present and beyond. It effectively illustrates how the Ukraine War is intertwined with historical events and ongoing developments in global order.
This great book delves into a topic far more expansive than its title implies, making it essential reading for anyone concerned about the current state of international politics.
The title may imply that the book focuses solely on the Ukraine War, but it offers much more than that. It skillfully places the conflict within a broader global framework, providing readers with remarkable clarity on the subject.
In essence, the book serves as a historical overview of world orders, tracing the evolution from early globalization through the post-World War II era to the present and beyond. It effectively illustrates how the Ukraine War is intertwined with historical events and ongoing developments in global order.
August 29, 2025
I found this book more difficult to follow than "Provoked" due to its many deep introductions to the underlying philosophies of economic and political systems all vying for dominance in the early 19 and 20th century Europe. For myself, I still find it hard to tell if there's any one insidious player but certainly towards the end of the 20th century, who ever was/is running the NATO alliance and fencing Russia into a corner for isolation and break-up and eventual dissolution were all in that category of people. IMO, Russia has a lot of science, technology and industry to contribute to the world and should/could exist on equal footing with any other NATO state (If we (US (?)) allowed) I've been told it's still the British Empire in charge but if that's so, they do hide it very well.
July 9, 2025
No war begins on the day that it begins. This book tries to trace back the buildup, which makes it an act of courage against the background of the incessant, universal hypnosis from the "unprovoked" camp. The role of debt and rentier "capitalism" could be covered in more detail. I may change the review later as I read on.
September 25, 2025
Relevant book for our times
This book offers a very different analysis of the current war in Ukraine. Prof. Diesen expertly traces the trajectory of the liberal world order and its congealing into a unipolar one under US control. He sees multipolarity as a historical opportunity for social conservatism to reassert itself.
This book offers a very different analysis of the current war in Ukraine. Prof. Diesen expertly traces the trajectory of the liberal world order and its congealing into a unipolar one under US control. He sees multipolarity as a historical opportunity for social conservatism to reassert itself.
January 11, 2026
Very detailed synopsis of the Westphalian system, as well as the conflict in Ukraine framed in a world order sense analysis. Diesen articulately displayed a perspective framing the Russo Ukraine conflict as a world order altering event, and also described the events that led to the war in far more detailed, transparent ways than I have seen in other books. Would recommend!
March 10, 2025
In the environment we're in today, more people need to read it to learn the complexity of the issue, especially from historical perspective.
It would have been nice if more details on border changes over time, at least to early 19th century, are provided.
It would have been nice if more details on border changes over time, at least to early 19th century, are provided.
December 12, 2024
Veldig opplysende og interessant.
February 5, 2025
Helt klart skrevet og sikkert fokus.
Fredskonferencer følges og diskuteres. Forskel mellem at hovere og at indrage de besejrede.
Fredskonferencer følges og diskuteres. Forskel mellem at hovere og at indrage de besejrede.
October 23, 2025
The best and most important book that I’ve read this year.
February 14, 2025
It is difficult to rate this book. On the one hand, I agree mostly with the author's analysis of the causes of the war in Ukraine. On the other hand, I do not think that ”cultural degradation” is exacerbating the decline of the Western-dominated world order. Nor do I think that conservatism is inherently good and fosters unity in societies.
Edit: I also think the theoretical underpinnings of this book are outdated. The focus on civilisations as stable units of comparison is, in my opinion, to deeply misunderstand the world. Upon reflection I must downgrade the rating to 2/5.
Edit: I also think the theoretical underpinnings of this book are outdated. The focus on civilisations as stable units of comparison is, in my opinion, to deeply misunderstand the world. Upon reflection I must downgrade the rating to 2/5.
January 9, 2026
Finest discussion on this topic. If you aspire to be informed vehemently about the core of Ukrainian crisis, it is a must read then.
Author provides succinct background of evolvement of modern states, spanning from the treaty of Westphalia to Congress of Vienna.
Author provides succinct background of evolvement of modern states, spanning from the treaty of Westphalia to Congress of Vienna.
February 22, 2025
Glenn Diesen’s The Ukraine War and the Eurasian World Order (2023) is a timely and provocative exploration of the geopolitical transformations unfolding in the wake of the Russia-Ukraine war. Diesen, a scholar of international relations with a focus on Russia and Eurasian integration, presents an argument that challenges the Western-centric narrative on the war. He contends that the conflict should not be viewed merely as an isolated event but as a symptom of a broader restructuring of the global order, in which Eurasia is emerging as a key geopolitical axis.
Diesen’s central thesis is that the war in Ukraine is not simply a conflict between Russia and Ukraine but rather a manifestation of deeper tensions between the Western liberal international order and an emerging multipolar world centered around Eurasia. He argues that NATO expansion and Western economic policies have accelerated Russia’s pivot toward China, Iran, and other Eurasian partners, leading to the erosion of Western hegemony. Through a combination of historical analysis and contemporary geopolitical assessments, the author illustrates how Russia’s strategic realignment is fostering alternative economic and security structures that challenge Western dominance.
One of the book’s strengths is its detailed examination of economic mechanisms underpinning this shift. Diesen explores initiatives such as China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), Russia’s Greater Eurasian Partnership, and the increasing use of non-dollar financial instruments as means of circumventing Western sanctions. By emphasizing these economic dimensions, the book provides a comprehensive perspective on how Russia and its partners are responding to Western economic coercion.
Additionally, Diesen’s discussion of the ideological and normative dimensions of the Ukraine war is particularly insightful. He critiques what he perceives as the West’s ideological rigidity and unwillingness to accommodate alternative governance models. He suggests that the war represents a broader struggle between different visions of world order: one centered on Western universalism and another based on regional multipolarity. While this argument is compelling, it is also highly contentious. Some scholars may take issue with his characterization of Western policies as overly rigid while portraying Russia’s actions as largely reactive.
However, the book is not without its weaknesses. One of the main criticisms that can be leveled against Diesen is that his analysis occasionally leans too heavily toward a Russia-centric perspective. While he rightly critiques Western interventionism and double standards, his treatment of Russian policies sometimes lacks a similar level of scrutiny. For instance, his discussion of Russia’s military actions and domestic governance does not engage deeply with counterarguments that highlight Russia’s own strategic miscalculations and internal weaknesses.
Moreover, the book’s reliance on sources and perspectives that align closely with Russian and Eurasian viewpoints may limit its appeal to a broader academic audience. A more balanced engagement with Western perspectives on international order would have strengthened the book’s analytical rigor.
Despite these limitations, The Ukraine War and the Eurasian World Order is an important contribution to the study of contemporary geopolitics. It challenges dominant Western narratives and provides an alternative framework for understanding the implications of the Ukraine war beyond the immediate battlefield. Scholars and policymakers interested in the future of Eurasian geopolitics, the decline of Western hegemony, and the evolution of global economic structures will find this book to be a valuable and thought-provoking read.
While some of Diesen’s arguments may be contested, his work serves as a crucial reminder that global power shifts are rarely one-dimensional. The book underscores the importance of considering multiple perspectives when analyzing international conflicts, making it a noteworthy addition to the literature on the Ukraine war and global geopolitics.
GPT
Diesen’s central thesis is that the war in Ukraine is not simply a conflict between Russia and Ukraine but rather a manifestation of deeper tensions between the Western liberal international order and an emerging multipolar world centered around Eurasia. He argues that NATO expansion and Western economic policies have accelerated Russia’s pivot toward China, Iran, and other Eurasian partners, leading to the erosion of Western hegemony. Through a combination of historical analysis and contemporary geopolitical assessments, the author illustrates how Russia’s strategic realignment is fostering alternative economic and security structures that challenge Western dominance.
One of the book’s strengths is its detailed examination of economic mechanisms underpinning this shift. Diesen explores initiatives such as China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), Russia’s Greater Eurasian Partnership, and the increasing use of non-dollar financial instruments as means of circumventing Western sanctions. By emphasizing these economic dimensions, the book provides a comprehensive perspective on how Russia and its partners are responding to Western economic coercion.
Additionally, Diesen’s discussion of the ideological and normative dimensions of the Ukraine war is particularly insightful. He critiques what he perceives as the West’s ideological rigidity and unwillingness to accommodate alternative governance models. He suggests that the war represents a broader struggle between different visions of world order: one centered on Western universalism and another based on regional multipolarity. While this argument is compelling, it is also highly contentious. Some scholars may take issue with his characterization of Western policies as overly rigid while portraying Russia’s actions as largely reactive.
However, the book is not without its weaknesses. One of the main criticisms that can be leveled against Diesen is that his analysis occasionally leans too heavily toward a Russia-centric perspective. While he rightly critiques Western interventionism and double standards, his treatment of Russian policies sometimes lacks a similar level of scrutiny. For instance, his discussion of Russia’s military actions and domestic governance does not engage deeply with counterarguments that highlight Russia’s own strategic miscalculations and internal weaknesses.
Moreover, the book’s reliance on sources and perspectives that align closely with Russian and Eurasian viewpoints may limit its appeal to a broader academic audience. A more balanced engagement with Western perspectives on international order would have strengthened the book’s analytical rigor.
Despite these limitations, The Ukraine War and the Eurasian World Order is an important contribution to the study of contemporary geopolitics. It challenges dominant Western narratives and provides an alternative framework for understanding the implications of the Ukraine war beyond the immediate battlefield. Scholars and policymakers interested in the future of Eurasian geopolitics, the decline of Western hegemony, and the evolution of global economic structures will find this book to be a valuable and thought-provoking read.
While some of Diesen’s arguments may be contested, his work serves as a crucial reminder that global power shifts are rarely one-dimensional. The book underscores the importance of considering multiple perspectives when analyzing international conflicts, making it a noteworthy addition to the literature on the Ukraine war and global geopolitics.
GPT
Displaying 1 - 27 of 27 reviews