Brexit, President Trump, and the Changing Geopolitics of Eastern Europe

Theodor Tudoroiu

• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
• Year: 2018
• Print ISBN:
  9783319779195
• eBook ISBN:
  9783319779201
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: American Government
• Index: Politics & International Relations

This book analyzes the combined consequences of Brexit and of the new US foreign policy under President Trump on the geopolitical situation of Eastern Europe. It perceives the evolution of the East European regional security complex as a struggle between the European Union's Kantian, win-win geopolitical vision and Russia's neoclassical geopolitics, also promoted by President Trump. In the most probable scenario, the latter approach will have the upper hand. The EU's post-Brexit control by the Franco-German axis will likely be followed by the geopolitical irrelevance of the EU due to the renationalization of member states' foreign policy, with Germany becoming the main West European actor. Consequently, Eastern Europe will be turned into the arena of a mainly three-cornered neoclassical geopolitics rivalry opposing Russia, the Franco-German axis and then Germany, and the US in alliance with the post-Brexit UK and certain East European states. The book will appeal to scholars acrossthe fields of International Relations, Geopolitics, European Studies, and Area Studies.

© The Author(s) 2018

Theodor TudoroiuBrexit, President Trump, and the Changing Geopolitics of Eastern Europehttps://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-77920-1_1

Begin Abstract

1. Introduction

Theodor Tudoroiu¹

(1)

Political Science Department, University of the West Indies, St. Augustine, Trinidad and Tobago

Theodor Tudoroiu

Email: [email protected]

Keywords

Eastern EuropePresident TrumpBrexitNeoclassical geopoliticsRussiaEuropean Union

End Abstract

One day in November 2016, a Russian MP stormed an uneventful session of the State Duma in Moscow to shout that Donald Trump had won the US presidential election. President Putin’s ‘lawmakers spontaneously leaped to their feet and delivered a raucous standing ovation’ (Weir 2016). Europeans had good reasons to be in a very different mood as they began to ‘wait in fear of the next Trump tweet’ (Ischinger 2017). Soon, there was ‘an insurgent in the White House’ and Washington found itself ‘in the grip of a revolution’ (The Economist, February 4, 2017). In addition to Russia, China, and Iran, another ‘hostile revisionist power has indeed arrived on the scene, but it sits in the Oval Office, the beating heart of the free world’ (Ikenberry 2017: 2). Under its influence, the USA would dismantle the international liberal order it has constructed since Bretton Woods, support dictators all over the world, and betray its allies. In Eastern Europe, it would seek a grand alignment with much admired President Putin. If invaded, North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) eastern members would first be checked if they ‘fulfilled their obligations to us’ (Sanger and Haberman 2016). Accordingly, a period of ‘geopolitical recession’ was announced (Bremmer and Kupchan 2017: 2). Alarmed East European leaders sent a letter to the President-elect explaining the dramatic regional consequences of his intensions to end sanctions on Russia and to accept ‘the division and subjugation of Ukraine.’ Aptly, their supreme argument was flattery: ‘Putin does not seek American greatness. As your allies, we do’ (Băsescu et al. 2017). To the general surprise, during the following months everybody noted that ‘Donald Trump’s foreign policy looks more normal than promised’ (The Economist, April 15, 2017). ‘More normal’ does not mean ‘normal;’ the behavior of the new President remains as atypical and unpredictable as ever. Still, at least in Eastern Europe, the US foreign policy does not look very different from what it used to be during the last period of the previous administration. Some prefer to take this as a strong indication of the fact that, ultimately, nothing is going to significantly change in that region. This book is based on a very different view. On the one hand, the Washington-Moscow relationship can develop in a number of very different ways, which include the unlikely but not impossible grand alignment desired by President Trump. On the other hand, East European geopolitics will be considerably influenced by the major changes in the EU integration process triggered by Brexit and by the Union’s identity crisis the latter illustrates. Consequences might not be obvious today, but their medium- and long-term impact on Eastern Europe and on the entire European continent is likely to be dramatic.

The theoretical approach used in this book is presented in Chapter 2. It is based on Stefano Guzzini’s view of neoclassical geopolitics enriched with elements from the Regional Security Complex Theory. The resulting thin cognitivist approach accordingly combines materialist and ideational elements. Its object of study is the East European regional security complex, which is defined as incorporating post-communist EU member states, the rest of the European Union, western Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) republics, and Russia. Two external powers, the USA and the post-Brexit UK, penetrate this complex.

Chapter 3 analyzes in what way the need for domestic legitimacy of President Putin’s authoritarian regime and the deep impact of neoclassical geopolitics on the development of Russia’s identity as an international actor have turned Moscow into an aggressive revisionist power that seriously endangers the stability of the East European regional security complex through the use of effective instruments that range from cyberwarfare and energy blackmail to hybrid wars and frozen conflicts. The Kremlin’s actions have already led to the ‘militarization of thinking’ in Eastern Europe and increasingly threaten European Union’s Kantian geopolitical vision. Russian cooperative projects such as the Eurasian Union or the Greater Europe proposal also exist, but they are indicative of the Kremlin’s willingness to adopt a non-antagonistic attitude in Eastern Europe only on its own terms, which are inspired by neoclassical geopolitics and require a never-ending series of Munich-type concessions from its partners. Due to Washington’s and Brussels’ rejection of such concessions, Russian aggressiveness has come to represent a sort of structural constraint that will impact considerably the future trajectory of the entire regional security complex.

A very different actor is scrutinized in Chapter 4. The ‘civilian power’ European Union is a mature tightly coupled security community that lacks a fully ‘communitized’ foreign policy. Brussels’ efforts to export its Kantian, win-win geopolitical vision to the Eastern neighborhood—which include the Eastern enlargement, the European Neighborhood Policy, and the Eastern Partnership—have resulted in conflict with Moscow. Institutionally and intellectually unprepared, lacking effective instruments and experience, the EU was unable to face the Russian neoclassical geopolitical offensive, as illustrated by the Ukrainian crisis. Even more importantly, inside the Union the populist wave and a number of overlapping serious economic and political crises have led to a ‘dynamic of disintegration’ and to an ‘existential crisis.’ Brexit represents the starting point of a process of change that might lead either to deeper integration or to the dominance of the Franco-German axis, which in turn could eventually evolve toward the geopolitical irrelevance of the EU accompanied by the transformation of Germany into the most important West European actor.

The role of the USA and its probable future evolution are analyzed in Chapter 5. Simplifying this complex topic to an extreme, at the systemic level of analysis there is the key linkage between the ‘pivot to Asia’ required by China’s geopolitical rise and the ‘reset’ of the relations with Russia needed in order to transfer resources to the Pacific. At the individual level, there are President Trump’s personality traits (that I examine using Aubrey Immelman’s psychology approach) and ensuing worldview, which includes hostility to China and admiration for President Putin. In between, at the state level of analysis, there are the opposition of Republicans and US foreign policy establishment to a Kremlin-friendly foreign policy and the critical issue of the Russiagate scandal, which greatly constraints the President’s pro-Moscow actions. Four possible scenarios ensue that include moderate US-Russia tensions, limited cooperation, a short-lived grand alignment, and a genuine one allowing for a complete American pivot to Asia leading to major tensions and possibly to a Cold War with China.

Chapter 6 examines the European states and identifies a hierarchy among their ability to influence geopolitical interactions within the East European security complex. The Franco-German axis will likely acquire unprecedented influence by taking control of the European Union. If—or rather when—both the axis and the Union decline for reasons related to the lack of balance between France and increasingly hegemonic Germany and to their opposing views on a number of issues that include the critical EU common commercial policy, Berlin will become the prime West European actor. Post-communist EU member states as well as the CIS republics will try to use US and British support in order to avoid joining Berlin’s or Moscow’s spheres of influence. Moreover, they will have to deal with major domestic challenges related to the rise of populist nationalism and to the ensuing development of authoritarian regimes.

However, this does not mean that East European states will passively be subjected to great power actions and structural factors. Chapter 7 show...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Front Matter
• 1. Introduction
• 2. Geopolitical Approaches, Regional Security Complexes, and Political Psychology
• 3. East European Interactions: Russian Foreign Policy as Structural Constraint
• 4. The European Union and Eastern Europe Before and After Brexit
• 5. The USA and Eastern Europe
• 6. Europe’s Great Powers and Small States
• 7. Domestic and Geopolitical Factors: Moldova as a CIS Case Study
• 8. Concluding Scenarios
• Back Matter