The past decade has furnished us with compelling proofs that there is no such thing as the ‘end of history’7. This ideological concept is, by far, not the first of its kind. Many viewed World War I as the war “to end all wars.” World War II prompted the discussion of an architecture for a global world. But each time the principles of progress and freedom would triumph over the archaic misconceptions and a dictatorship, a build-up for a new round of the fight began brewing shortly afterward. In the 1920s, it was spearheaded by the defeated Germany, in the 1940s by the disgruntled Soviet Union, and in the 2010s by Russia whose leadership thought the country had been humiliated by the outcome of the Cold War. None of those stints was a carbon copy of the preceding one. But along with major takeaways came a slew of new mistakes. However, one thing is certain. It is highly unlikely that a country can become the West’s friend and ally without being co-opted into its political structures.
7 — This concept was called into question a while ago. See, e.g., Kagan, Robert. The Return of History and the End of Dreams, New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2008.
The epoch where Putin’s Russia was open to interacting with the West to the point of almost being co-opted is long over. This page has been turned. The confrontation has become all too real and can only end with one side defeated. The question is, though, whether this defeat will come off the back of a large-scale armed conflict, like the two world wars, or it will result from an economic and social competition, as was the case during the Cold War. Given the existing nuclear weapons, the latter scenario would be far more preferable.
Truth be told, this scenario suggests the West shifting from its steady yet fruitless advances of the 1990s and 2000s to a strategic defense against Russia, China, and other forces targeting the erosion of the world order. We believe the Western government made a critical error by helping to modernize both China and Russia without either of the two assuring it they were not going to challenge the existing global order. Fixing this mistake will take time and a tremendous effort, and this period will involve accepting certain injustices and making certain deals and trade-offs. But in retrospect, it should be said that the West’s post-Cold War ideological and economic superiority was far more indisputable than it looked like in the wake of its enemies’ surrender in 1918 and 1945.