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18.01.2010

PAX AMERICANA-2, OR GOOD BYE, AMERICA?

   

Gagik Terteryan

The current economic recession, according to some signs and optimistic statements by some state officials, seems to have reached the “bottom” and the global economy is showing signs of recovery. At the same time, according to the various analytical centers the current system of economic security still remains more than unstable and vulnerable. Particularly, the professor of the Columbian University, the Nobel Prize winner in economy Josef Stiglitz is sure that the expectations connected with the US economy are not be founded and the current crisis first of all means the collapse of the American capitalist system. In his opinion, other countries should be focused not on the US but on their own possibilities1. Another American Nobel Prize winner James Buchannan agrees to Stiglitz’s opinion. It can be supposed that under such conditions financial and geo-economic developments, which can affect the whole complex of the geopolitical ideas formed in the recent decades, are possible.

It is characteristic that quite recently among pessimistic forecasts the uncontrollable proliferation of the nuclear weapon and the disastrous consequences of the possible nuclear conflicts (e.g. between India and Pakistan) had been observed. Meanwhile, today in information field the discussions on the collapse of the global financial system and its sometimes not less disastrous consequences are prevailing.

Let us mention that the elaboration and the further discussion of such scenarios (which can be regarded as a kind of the stage of the “development” of those scenarios) are the important components of the political culture and today it is difficult to imagine the political and economic planning without scenario technologies.

Scenario planning

It is supposed that the theoretical bases for this method were elaborated in the 60s of the last century and the first scenario planning of practical importance was carried out in 1971 by the analysts of the Royal Datch Shell oil company: they tried to figure out the possible options of rising of the oil prices by the OPEC and to forecast the consequences which was of great significance at that time. It should be mentioned that the scenario elaborations contain many elements of expert forecasts2. At the same time the scenario planning is not only directed to the formation of the idea about the future. It mainly allows to suppose that under this or that condition (current or the one which may happen in the future) what kind of political, economic and other developments may take place and what kind of consequences those processes may have.

Scenario thinking allows outlining more freely possible or sometimes mutually exclusive and radical variants of local or global developments. It is remarkable that during the scenario planning the imagination of the experts is highly rated and it is not a mere chance that very often in such elaborations the science-fiction writers, chess players and other so-called “creative” individuals are involved. Such a “free” approach to the possible developments, among other advantages, allows to be prepared before ahead to the most unexpected military and political or economic turnarounds. Due to the aforementioned factors the “scenario technologies” became predominant not only among the state structures or “think tanks” working under their patronage, but also among big commercial companies.

There are various methods of scenario elaborations, but, as a rule, they imply the fulfillment of the following steps:

  • the general background of the development of the situation is cleared up as far as possible and in this subtext the events which may take place reliably are distinguished,
  • the factors and parameters which may mostly affect the given event are decided,
  • the extreme values of the aforementioned factors and parameters are settled as far as possible,
  • as a result of the logical combinations of the aforementioned factors and parameters the scenarios, which are highly possible or, at least, are not excluded theoretically, are elaborated.

Scenarios connected with dollar depreciation

The scenario planning used to be the monopoly of the western experts; meanwhile today we can also meet, for example, Russian researches. Particularly, among the specialists serious interest was aroused by the newly published work by D. Motorin and co-authors3 where the possible mechanisms and consequences of the dollar depreciation are presented. They are supposed to be rather realistic and today they are discussed also by the American experts. The following theses underlie the postulates of the depreciation of the main world currency:

  • this does not contradict to any regularity of the economic or social development,
  • such processes, as the numerous analyses devoted to the recent crisis show, are previously planned and carried out by some power centers.

Pax Americana – 2, Island America and “Chimeria”

In case of the first scenario we consider the case when the US, proceeding form definite factors, depreciates dollar itself.

As it is known today almost all the actors in global economy keep their currency reserves in dollars or in the so-called UST. It is natural that those actors are interested in the dollar, which is basis of the word economy, not to collapse. Taking the advantage of this reality, the US through some information and financial manipulations provokes everybody to buy dollar and UST in order to preserve the existing financial system. To supply its demand the US is “compelled” to begin printing dollars liberally which depreciates that currency several times and essentially reduces the foreign debt of the US and, at the same time, it bankrupts all the members of the financial community. Alongside, the US, managing this whole process, being in full control of the situation and printing dollar mint, has time to buy all the production assets all over the world at low prices. As a result of the complex of those actions the US regains its global monopolistic position all over the world and thus resets the one-polar world order: the “second American world” (Pax Americana – 2) age begins.

According to the other variant of this scenario, the Americans while carrying out their plans meet the serious opposition by other powers (mainly China and European Union) and cannot implement fully their plans, particularly they do not manage to buy assets abroad. Consequently, the US will partially solve its domestic problems and will turn into the developed and a little isolated state without any claims to world domination (Island America scenario). It is characteristic that American economists Charles Rowley and Nathaniel Smith called the similar scenario “Argentina” meaning that the status of the US might be the one of that Latin American country.

The remarkable one is the variant when the so-called “dollar vacuum cleaner” merges the US and China. In this case the “depreciation” has passed successfully. Let us remind you that the discussions on the joint “managing” of the world by Beijing and Washington or the so-called “Chimerica”4 activated in January 2009 when the advisor of the US president Zbigniew Brzezinski in fact called for the US and PRC to solve global problems together. It should be mentioned that such a tendency for the development first of all constitutes a menace to Russia and it is not a mere chance that the variants of the Chimerica scenario consider the Chinese occupation of the Siberian and Far East territories of Russia which are rich with natural resources.

“Chirussia” or Good bye, America

Perhaps the aforementioned fact makes Russian authorities look for mutual and often anti-American commonalities with the PRC. From geo-political point of view the strengthening of the US position in Central Asia bothers both powers and the creation of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization can be regarded as its manifestation. Proceeding from these the expert community also considers rapprochement of those countries which is called by some experts the union of the Bear and Dragon. This union we would call, by the analogy to Chimerica, Chirussia.

Those “scenario writers” think it is possible that the PRC and the RF, carrying out appropriate preparatory works and averting the US financial actions on financial market begin to bring to market their dollars and UST5, and at the same time they “turn on” the dollar “vacuum cleaner” and buy all the raw material assets all over the world. According to the variants of that scenario, the response of the US may manifest itself in the form of military actions to which, however, the allies are prepared. In the new world order the countries with biggest human and economic (PRC) and territorial and material (RF) resources are dominating.

It is remarkable that the US may lose its leading positions not only due to the Chirussia’s activities. According to a number of scenarios (which, by the way, has been considered since 2000), the issue of the self-destruction of that state will become urgent in case the US cannot manage to cease the processes of the economic recession which are of system character and they become uncontrollable. E.g., in connection with the growth of the foreign dept (up to $17 trillion) the inflation, bankruptcies and clashes burst out, the population escapes from the country in panic because of the chaos and etc. This scenario, which somehow reminds the collapse of the USSR, has been named Good bye, America.

Some conclusions

The presented developments, of course, do not include all the possible variants. It should not be also forgotten that some of the scenarios discussed on the information field purpose to disorient the international community. Alongside the global actors try to promote the implementation of the scenarios which are positive for them and to avert the negative ones. Amid such a difficult situation for such small countries as the RA it is very difficult to orient and act efficiently. Due to the understandable reasons our analytical community is more concerned with the regional processes which constitute direct menace to our national security. At the same time it is necessary to create substructures which would try to follow global developments and the scenario elaborations carried out in their contexts. In this context the coordination of the intellectual resources of the Armeniancy and formation of the network analytical centers with the help of the Armenian communities in the global power centers (USA, RF and Europe) become topical. Perhaps, the analyses received from such structures would allow acting adequately in current difficult and dynamic situation.

1http://fintimes.km.ru/59870

2See, particularly, Գագիկ Հարությունյան, «Ապագայի ձևավորումը», Գլոբուս. ազգային անվտանգություն, #4(8), էջ 3, 2009։

3Денис Моторин, Валентин Бианки, Александр Серавин, Сергей Сычев, «После WC: мир после кризиса», Санкт-Петербург, 2009.

4From the combination of words China and America

5Let us mention that today the dollar reserves of China are about $2 trilion.


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