A fading peace
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine could mark a disturbing change: the end of a global era of relative peace.
While it doesn’t always feel this way, since the 1990s the world has suffered less war than at any other period in history. War and its resulting death toll plummeted with the end of the Cold War in 1991 – and the ensuing end of direct and proxy conflicts between the world’s great powers.
“The end of the Cold War is the greatest thing to peace in a long time,” said Jeremy Shapiro, research director at the European Council on Foreign Relations.
But the world has changed. After emerging from the Cold War as the sole superpower, the United States has increasingly weakened, mired in failed wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Meanwhile, Russia and China developed into more formidable powers; they are now better positioned to challenge a world shaped by American norms and rules.
Invading Ukraine is the biggest example of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s willingness to challenge an American-led order. Another issue is Russia’s intervention in the Syrian civil war. China has its own interests – in control Taiwan and growing influence in East and Southeast Asia.
The strengthen alliances The relationship between Russia and China in recent years also shows that they are drawing new boundaries in terms of global competition. And in response to these threats, other potential powers, such as Europeare rebuilding their own army.
Peace has not been this fragile for decades, experts say.
How does conflict reduce?
For most of human history, war was the norm. Between the 16th and 18th centuries, great powers fought each other most years. And in the 19th and 20th centuries, they fought conflicts that culminated in two world wars that left more than 100 million people dead and tens of millions more displaced.
But after the Cold War, the rate of new conflicts more than halved, according to Bear Braumoeller, an international security expert at Ohio State University. Conflicts have happened on a smaller scale. War deaths dropped sharply. (Part of that decline is also due to the improvement of the military heal wounded soldiers.)
William Wohlforth, an international relations expert at Dartmouth College, told me the drop was unprecedented. “We could not find another period with a change in conflicting trends to compare with,” he said.
Several elements have contributed to this peace. Lack of great power competition; No country can seriously challenge the United States. Nuclear weapons also continue to prevent nations from going to war with each other, because of possible apocalyptic consequences. The increasingly integrated global economy makes any war a threat to everyone’s continued development. And peacekeeping organizations, such as the United Nations and the EU, have created facilities for countries to try to resolve disputes and enforce anti-war rules (though not always with success). ).
Another factor: Great power is no longer synonymous with the desire to conquer. U.S. officials in the nation’s century as a superpower have viewed attempts to annex other nations as a direct path to undermining the world order they built and led. The United States’ own acts of aggression – in Vietnam, Panama, Iraq and elsewhere – aim to maintain that order, but the justifications are flawed.
The challengers are rising
Russia and China never liked the idea of an American-led world order. For decades, both have called for a new structure in which they become larger, or even dominate, dictates how the world works.
Russia has its own imperial ambitions in Eastern Europe, and it views NATO’s expansion into the Western doorstep as an existential threat.
China has benefited economically from the liberal and globalized order. But its leaders also want to crack down on domestic dissidents, the democratic government in Taiwan, protesters in Hong Kong and mainly Muslim Uighurs. among others, without outside interference.
These are long-term goals for Russia and China, but now they have a greater ability to act on their beliefs. Putin has consolidated his power after more than two decades in power, and during that time he has moved to modernize the Russian military (although the standoff in Ukraine has exposed major weaknesses). China has grown economically to the point where it could soon rival the United States, and it is also expanding its military power and influence in the region.
That could lead to greater power competition – potentially through a new wave of proxy wars between these countries and the West or worse, direct conflict.
But any major change in the world order depends largely on what China does, as America’s only real adversary With the risk of war, China could continue to follow suit. pursue its interests with economic or diplomatic leverage over military force, says Stacie Goddard, an international security expert at Wellesley College.
China has also repeatedly called for respecting the sovereignty of all countries. There are good reasons to be skeptical of that commitment, including China’s interests in Taiwan and its continued support for Russia after its invasion of Ukraine. But if China means it, the war in Ukraine could end up looking less like a sign of what’s to come and more like a deadly final blow from the Cold War era.
War situation
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President Biden denounce the Russian invasion and declared that Putin “cannot remain in power”. But a White House official played down the possibility that Mr Biden had called for the Russian president to step down.
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While Biden was traveling in Poland, two Lviv . attack missiles in western Ukraine, not far from the Polish border. Earlier attacks signaled that Russia was downsizing its ambitions.
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However, Western officials picked up between senior Russian commanders about giving up their capture of Kyiv and other key regions in Ukraine, according to two people with access to intelligence.
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Ukrainian forces caused a counterattack on the outskirts of Kyiv to block the way to the Russian capital, destroy tanks and kill Russian troops.
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