Geo-politically speaking, the 2 countries cannot be any more dissimilar from each other. I feel in Iran's situation, they do genuinely feel threatened by us. After all, we do literally surround that country with troops - we have a Nato ally and airbase in Turkey, we have troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. We have military bases in Kuwait and Qatar. And the last 8 years of the Bush Administration policy of regime change certainly didn't help matters. I remember in the democratic primary, senator Obama quite famously said to the New York times, that the first thing he intends to do if he's elected to office, is to very publicly and very explicitly take regime change off the table in regards to Iran. Consequently, a lot of that threat within Iran has begun to subside, for example, one of the biggest surprises during the lead-up of the Iran elections between Mousavi and Ahmadinejad, was that the United states really wasn't an issue as it was in past elections.
I was talking mostly in terms on the issue of Iran. China is always going to resistant on any sort of sanctions. They rely heavily on Iran’s vast energy reserves to offset its own shortages. Which is why Russia is the key on this, while they have their own invested interests, they genuinely do not want Iran to have a nuclear weapons capability.
Primakov's Triangle has always been a nice fantasy. The problem however, is that China, Russia and India tend to distrust each other more than they distrust us. That pravda article even states the unlikeliness of that ever happening. A China that is growing economically and militarily isn't necessary good news for Russia (a country that is demographically shrinking faster than Europe) certainly in terms of influence over Central Asia. It's not like we're ever going to be best-friends with Russia, given the history of our two countries there's always going to be an element of mutual enmity, but there's also a mutual desire to seek cooperation and partnership on certain geo-political issues that are important to both of our strategic interests.
Maybe it's just bluster on their part, but if so they'll look making an unnecessary veto threat then backing down when Russia supports the rest of the Security Council. Russia now has strong reason to do so, since the economic benefits of Iran getting nuclear energy fuel processed there could be as great as selling Iran nuclear weapons technology, with far less risk.
No, on a host of issues, the rapidly increasing economic and diplomatic influence of China is far more critical than Russias.
I was talking mostly in terms on the issue of Iran. China is always going to resistant on any sort of sanctions. They rely heavily on Iran’s vast energy reserves to offset its own shortages. Which is why Russia is the key on this, while they have their own invested interests, they genuinely do not want Iran to have a nuclear weapons capability.
Both countries, however, recognize that for either to gain the long coveted global position America enjoys America must first be removed from it. Most people seem to take the attitude that America has too much influence and the world needs to reduce that to have a partnership of equals. Thing is, the world has never done that; attempts to do so result in a global power vacuum someone always fills. Russia and China both hope to be the ones to do that, but China is in a far better position, largely thanks to our aid and the collapse of Russia with the Soviets fall. It's more likely they'll continue to work together against the US than oppose each other in the short term; they can always pull what Hitler did with the von Ribbentrop Pact, but in the interim they're increasingly presenting a united front, and increasingly getting global support:
http://english.pravda.ru/world/20/91/366/15273_alliance.html
http://www.heritage.org/Research/RussiaandEurasia/BG1459.cfm
http://english.pravda.ru/world/20/91/366/15273_alliance.html
http://www.heritage.org/Research/RussiaandEurasia/BG1459.cfm
Primakov's Triangle has always been a nice fantasy. The problem however, is that China, Russia and India tend to distrust each other more than they distrust us. That pravda article even states the unlikeliness of that ever happening. A China that is growing economically and militarily isn't necessary good news for Russia (a country that is demographically shrinking faster than Europe) certainly in terms of influence over Central Asia. It's not like we're ever going to be best-friends with Russia, given the history of our two countries there's always going to be an element of mutual enmity, but there's also a mutual desire to seek cooperation and partnership on certain geo-political issues that are important to both of our strategic interests.
Did Iran just blink?
- 06/10/2009 08:45:28 AM
574 Views
One hopes for the best, but we'll see in the long run.
- 06/10/2009 03:11:47 PM
289 Views
For once I agree with you completely.
- 06/10/2009 07:43:52 PM
356 Views
You can't really compare the situation in NK to Iran
- 07/10/2009 07:13:02 AM
280 Views
Not completely, but there are many parallels.
- 07/10/2009 10:37:53 AM
323 Views
Apples and Oranges, really
- 07/10/2009 08:22:54 PM
296 Views