'Tit for Tat'. Hegemons, Impunity, and the end of International Law

International Law is dead, but the Russians are not the only murderers.

The fragile international system erected at the end of WW2 has never worked as it was supposed to. Up till today, the UN rests upon a flimsy charter that postulates the need for collective security in order to deter aggression and ensure peace. This ideal has never been fulfilled in the ways which it's founding father envisaged it to. Collective Security only happens effectively when a hegemon chooses to step forward and lead the world into the maelstrom of a disaster - or so we think. Contrary to our beliefs in the benefits of a 'benevolent hegemony', this has been more of a bane than a boon, and the world must repudiate this concept in order to restore the sanctity of international law and create conditions stable enough for global peace to ensue.

The recent Ossentian crisis has given cry to a few claims. These will be addressed and debunked.

1) The Russians were doing the Ossetians a favour.

Wrong. Yes, the Georgians were about to pulverized them. Yes, the Russians have protected the Ossetians momentarily by intervening on their behalf, hereby preventing a massacre of sorts comparable to ethnic cleansing in Kosovo. It is seeming blindness however, to ignore the larger implications of the matter. Russia, until very recently, has been obstructing attempts by the OSCE (Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe) to conduct observation patrols in the 'security zone' created, displaced Georgians residing in the troubled regions in order to shake the faith placed in the Saakashvili government, discredited the Saakashvili regime further by hitting hard at the very nationalist mandate the government rests upon (to restore the seccessionist territories of Ossetia and Abkhazia), and have even resorted to imposing a regime of fear instigated by an ethnic chechen battalion caleld the 'Vostok' with a reputation for cruelty and looting. Continued Russian presence in Georgia is a devious attempt to cripple the country in the long-term.

Russia has been attempting to reassert it's sphere of influence, which had eroded via multifold political and economic problems, not just withstanding the terrible transition from communism back into the fold of socialist democracy, but also partly due to the lost of strategic influence over the Slavonic states, with the expansion of EU and NATO possibly up to it's borders. The crippling occupation of Poti, Georgia's largest Black Sea port, Senaki, home to a Georgian military base, and coming close physically to Tbilisi itself is the attempt to exert both real and psychological influence in the region, and internationally. This is not just about distracting a domestic polity from ongoing economic woes at home. This is the attempt to tighten the reins and consequently demand 'respect' and 'authority' as a world power. This is not the harbinger of international peace.

2) This is the beginning of a New Cold War.

Wrong. The crisis is not premised upon an ideological rivalry with the West. Rather, Russia was merely appropriating the 'practices' of the West, and merely using it in a seemingly childish 'tit-for-tat' way that makes international law and regimes a mockery. For this, we have America to thank. The US fiasco in Afghanistan and Iraq has shown the world that it exemplifies a pityful double-standard - or perhaps, a single-standard, as Prof. Chomsky has shown in his various books, that the opinion and dictates of others are necessarily subservient to US interests. This mask of benevolence has been violently ripped off their faces. With this loss of credibility, the US has lost the moral high-ground to criticise a returning hegemon, Russia, for its impudence in the international scene.

The lesson learnt then, is that the promises of the hegemon, be it their verbal declarations or our high idealistic expectations, cannot and will not always be fulfilled. The dangerous precedent set by a loose and rampant America in the previous decades could very well spell the end of sovereignty, and the sanctity of international law as we speak, for they have shown that every and any hegemon can do whatever it wants.

3) International Peace is best secured in a bi-polar world.

A terrible lie and falsehood.

The hegemon's idea of international peace is that which is ensured when the goals of it's 'underlings' match with their own. However while the states within the sphere of influence are free from the other faction, freedom cannot be guaranteed from the hegemon itself. They are free, and yet imprisoned. As such, any attempts to return to a bipolar system would necessarily abrogate the basic tenets and fundamentals of international law, which includes the sanctity of sovereignty of the nation-state and non-intervention in domestic affairs. These are necessarily freedoms in order to ensure relative domestic peace and prosperity, before international peace can ensue.

In order to protect our world from the ruthless war-mongering of a few, we need to take a strong stand against unilateral aggression, and the belief in the benefits of hegemony. A world without hegemons is a better bet for international security as everyone would be equally weak, and therefore need international law and the regimes to ensure their survival. The hegemons must be forced to be as free as the rest of the world. While an 'inter-state communism' is not going to happen because of the necessary geopolitics facing each state, the international community, and especially the EU, needs to unite and strongly repudiate and discourage countries with hegemonic intentions.

MR D.
16 September 2008